Home

Rendering with substituted validation input

1. termined indicia wherein the portion includes a bar code 20 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 19 wherein the bar code has a value corresponding to the object to be substituted 21 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 16 wherein the means for making the object to be the manual input further comprises means for forming a transmission message to be transmitted over an interconnected network to an electronic mail address 22 A digital transmitter device comprising means for composing a digital image from an optically scanned image means for detecting predetermined indicia in the digital image means for receiving handwriting image at a touch sensi tive input device of the digital transmitter device means for performing a validation routine of the hand writing image against an access control database and means when a result of the validation routine is positive for forming the handwriting image or representation thereof as a substitute for the detected predeter mined indicia in the digital image and outputting a rendering of the digital image 23 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 22 wherein the means for detecting further comprises means for locating a portion of the digital image corresponding to the predetermined indicia wherein the portion exhibits a pre determined range of reflectance values 24 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 23 wher
2. adding a dynamic data item to said form template 43 The method as defined in claim 40 further comprising repositioning reformatting reshaping or resizing elements of said form template in accordance with a predetermined position of said scanned image and a size of said scanned image 44 A method performed by a digital transmitter device the method comprising optically scanning an image substituting into a digital image at least one of input received at the digital transmitter device wherein Oct 20 2005 the digital image is formed by the optically scanning the input is substituted for predetermined indicia in the digital image and the predetermined indicia is detectable by the digital transmitter device in the digital image and the optically scanned image wherein the optically scanned image is substituted for a predefined inser tion field in the digital image validating what is substituted for predetermined indicia in the digital image against an access control database such that when the validation for the scanned image is negative the method further comprising outputting a diagnostic reflecting the absence of validation and positive the method further comprises rendering the digital image having the substitution
3. each having a significance similar to that of the different bar codes 0027 The different bar codes and markings as described above can represent different shapes and sizes of insertion fields For instance a user may use ink to mark a periphery of an insertion field or the user can make a mark on the hardcopy for which the periphery of an insertion field is predetermined For instance the mark may be an indicator for an insertion field having a shape that 15 any of a circle having a one 1 inch radius a two 2 inch square an ellipse having two foci separated by one 1 inch etc Two dots made by a user on a paper document may interpreted by a detection routine as indicating respectively Oct 20 2005 the upper left and lower right corners of a rectangular insertion field The type shape and size of markings that correspond to insertion fields of various shapes sizes and positions are not limited by the examples given herein 0028 Upon detection of the detectable indicia corre sponding to each insertion field and the shape size and position thereof e g invisible ink bar code or other significant mark the detection routine can also determine what is to be inserted into each insertion field For instance the detection of ink having a specific reflective property may be recognized as a cue to prompt the user for input After the user has responded with input to the prompt the optically scanned image w
4. the size and other param eters of the one or more predefined insertion fields can be communicated to the digital transmitter device 102 from the server 106 on which a form template is resident The digital transmitter device 102 can then automatically scan one or more images with scanning mechanism 212 at an appropri ate resolution scale and size to fit the one or more predefined insertion fields in the form template 0083 By way of further example FIG 5 can be deemed to represent an illustration of a form template 502 As shown in FIG 5 the form template 502 includes standard elements that remain the same from use to use These standard elements are exemplified in FIG 5 by the non descript areas outside of predefined insertion fields 504 506 The pre defined form template 502 may also be a dynamic form that includes data items that will be obtained and added each time the form is completed For example a dynamic form may include a date or time stamp The dynamic form may also include a field for data that is pulled from an available data source for example the Internet and added to the form such a price quote for a particular security etc Additionally the exemplary form template 502 seen in FIG 5 includes predefined insertion fields 504 506 into which scanned images graphical and or textual are to be inserted 0084 way of example a handwritten signature and address data can be on one or more pieces of paper that i
5. 102 The execution of the image composer 217 composes the document with the input or retrieved text and or objects substituted into the one or more insertion fields thereby producing a digital rendering of the document that was scanned at step 816 At step 826 the digital rendering can be output by printing facsimile transmission or by one or more e mail messages that are assembled and transmitted to the e mail address es input or otherwise specified by the user at step 806 Attached to each e mail message is a file containing a digital rendering of the document Alternatively the user may be permitted an option at step 826 to preview the document with insertions prior to the output thereof As a still further alternative an embedded digital certificate of authenticity e g a check sum can be included in a transmission of the digital rendering The recipient of the transmission e g a facsimile machine an email recipient a web site etc can provide verification using the embedded digital certificate of authenticity that then sender was indeed authenticated After the step 826 process 800 returns to step 804 to repeat the foregoing procedure Oct 20 2005 0100 FIG 9 shows a flow diagram according to another embodiment of the present invention depicting a method for using a digital transmitter device With this in mind CPU s 202 can be configured to perform the operations described below By way of further example the
6. address of a network resource on a network and a destination location thereat By way of example and not by way of limitation the electronic address US 2005 0231746 A1 14 can be a file folder address at a server on a network and can also be a Web site address at a server on a network 0112 Although some implementations of the present invention have been illustrated in the accompanying Draw ings and described in the foregoing Detailed Description it will be understood that the present invention is not limited to the exemplary implementations disclosed but is capable of numerous rearrangements modifications and substitu tions without departing from the spirit of the invention as set forth and defined by the following claims What is claimed is 1 A computer readable medium having computer execut able instructions which when executed on one or more processors of a digital transmitter device direct the digital transmitter device to perform a method comprising composing a digital image from an optically scanned image at the digital transmitter device detecting predetermined indicia in the digital image receiving a handwriting image at a touch sensitive input device of the digital transmitter device corresponding to the detected predetermined indicia in the digital image forming the received handwriting image into the digital image as a substitute for the detected predetermined indicia in the digital image performi
7. an optional routine at step 920 the digital transmitter device 102 can be configured to permit or prevent one or more specific insertion fields from cropping the underlying portion of the optically scanned document as disclosed above e g the no crop ping option As a further option at step 920 the size and or shape of the retrieved text and or objects and their corre sponding insertion fields can be adjusted to fit one another within the given size and shape of the optically scanned document 0106 After step 920 process 900 performs step 922 through the execution of the image composer 217 by digital transmitter device 102 that composes the document with the insertion fields filled in thereby producing a rendering of the document At step 922 the process 900 moves to step 924 where the rendering can be output by printing facsimile transmission or by one or more e mail messages that are assembled and transmitted to one or more e mail addresses A file containing the rendering of the document can be attached to each e mail message that 15 to be transmitted The rendering can be output to devices that are referenced by a Universal Resource Locator URL a telephone number and by any other known means for addressing output Alternatively the user may be permitted the option at step 924 to preview the document with insertions prior to the output thereof After the step 924 process 900 returns to step 904 to repeat the foregoing p
8. be ascertained either by a query that is made to another network device that is in communication with the digital transmitter device through an interconnected network such as a server or by a query that is made directly to the digital transmitter device itself Exemplary System for Configuration of a Digital Transmitter Device 0041 FIG 1a illustrates an example of a system envi ronment 100 suitable for implementing an embodiment of the present invention The system environment 100 contem plates a plurality of digital transmitter devices 102 i e g 102 1 102 2 etc that can be in communication with an interconnected network 104 Interconnected network 104 is in communication with one or more server s 106 Each server 106 i can be an e mail message server that serves one or more e mail addresses to which any digital transmitter device 102 can send an e mail message Digital transmitter devices 102 may be stand alone devices that have a scanning mechanism and may also have an output mecha nism such as a printer a copier or a fax machine As such each digital transmitter devices 102 7 can be a multifunction peripheral MFP device that combines the scanning mecha nism and the output mechanism into a single device A digital transmitter device 102 i can function while uncoupled or isolated from other devices A digital trans mitter device 102 i therefore can be a device such as a copier a scanner or a fax machine such as are
9. can be used to accept the input of an e mail address insertions to be inserted into insertion fields and a manually input signature from a user at the digital transmit ter device By way of example a sequence of menus that can be displayed upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 of digital transmitter device 102 is seen in FIGS 3 4 and 6 A menu screen 302 seen in FIG 3 is displayed upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 of digital transmitter device 102 Menu screen 302 shows various options to be selected by a user of digital transmitting device 102 In the example provided in FIG 3 a user has already input the character string A93B at reference numeral 304 on menu screen 302 This character string 304 can be used for any of a variety of purposes For instance the character string 304 can be a User ID that is to be compared against an access control data base to deter mine if the User ID corresponds to particular use privileges with respect to the digital transmitter device 102 Alterna tively the character string 304 can be a form code that by the input thereof is used to identify a form template having one or more predetermined insertion fields Once the pre determined insertion fields of the form template have been communicated to the digital transmitter device 102 text and or objects can be scanned by scanning mechanism 212 for respective fitting into the one or more predetermined insertion fields 0072 When the user selec
10. contents of these two 2 fields were directly or indirectly obtained from the user input as shown in FIG 6 according to an embodiment of the present invention 0017 FIGS 8 9 are flow diagrams depicting respective processes for use in a computing and communication envi ronment having a digital transmitter device as in FIG 1a for example in accordance with exemplary embodiments of the present invention DETAILED DESCRIPTION 0018 Implementations described herein provide access control to a digital transmitter device based upon user input where the user input corresponds to text and or objects that are inserted into a document at one or more predetermined insertion fields without editing the document with a word processor In a first implementation the document is marked up with detectable indicia at one or more predetermined insertion fields where the text and or objects are to be inserted The marked up document is scanned to form an optically scanned image and the detectable indicia is detected in the optically scanned image to ascertain the one or more predetermined insertion fields The user is prompted to enter the text and or objects or representations thereof that are to be respectively inserted into the one or more predetermined insertion fields Alternatively the text and or objects or representations thereof can be optically scanned and then respective inserted into the one or more predeter mined insertion fields I
11. flow diagram depicted in FIG 9 illustrates certain exemplary functions that can be performed using CPU s 202 and the other resources in digital transmitter device 102 Here a process 900 is provided Steps in process 900 have functional similarities to the steps in process 800 which has been discussed above 0101 FIG 9 shows process 900 beginning at step 902 which directs a process flow to step 904 At step 904 process 900 waits for the scanning mechanism 212 of the digital transmitter device 102 to be ready If so the process 900 moves control to step 906 where the scanning mechanism 212 scans in the document for storage at the digital trans mitter device Step 908 calls for the execution of detection application 216 to locate detectable indicia in the optically scanned image of the document as discussed above When an insufficient detection results process 900 displays corre sponding diagnostics at step 910 and then terminates Alter natively the detection application 216 can be configured to terminate after a diagnostic display when it has been deter mined that an expected form code has not been entered The form code however could be entered at step 912 and then processed similarly to what has been discussed above with respect step 812 of FIG 8 thereby identifying both a form template and its corresponding one or more predetermined insertion fields 0102 When the location of the one or more predeter mined insertion fiel
12. shown in FIG la 0042 Digital transmitter devices 102 i are generally dis tinguishable from devices such as desktop PCs personal computers laptop PCs and pocket PCs by their limited purpose and limited user interface or input output capabili ties For example FIG 15 shows a user interface for a digital transmitter device 102 i The user interface includes various sections of input devices to perform respective functions with the digital transmitter device Section 102a allows input of alphanumeric strings with respective number keys in order perform input to send a facsimile and or an e mail Section 102b shows a touch sensitive menu screen 102e for receiving input and or outputting a display of diagnostics and or status Various menu buttons are also shown in Section 102b Section 102c shows a copy start button to make a copy of one or more sheets of optically scanned paper Section 102d shows a scan button to optically scan one or more pieces of paper As an alternative to the user interface depicted in FIG 15 digital transmitter device 102 i can have a simpler front menu panel with a limited Screen space and less input buttons or keys As another alternative to the user interface depicted in FIG 15 digital transmitter device 102 can have an integrated keyboard such as a QWERTY keyboard to assist in entering data 0043 A digital transmitter device 102 i is typically ori ented toward performing one general task such
13. their respective insertion fields within the bit map or other output that is a digital representation of the scanned documents modified scanned image is then composed by image composer 217 The modified scanned image that is composed includes all insertion fields having the corre sponding text and objects inserted therein by way of sub stitution for the detectable indicia 0065 The text and or objects can be inserted in their respective insertion fields in a variety of ways For instance an insertion field can be rendered in the modified scanned image to appear as a water mark so that the one or more superimpositions do not substantially obscure any portion of the images on the rendered documents The superimposi tions can appear to be integral with the images on the rendered document so that their appearance thereon is easily noticed and could not be easily removed To further mini mize obscuring any portion of the images on the rendered documents the superimpositions can be situated in a margin or scaled so as to be small relative to the rendered document page size To do so the digital transmitter device can be configured manually or otherwise to have control over the location and size of the water mark on the rendered docu ments 0066 Once the document composition process has digi tized the scanned object data with the insertion fields as discussed above the composed documents can be printed US 2005 0231746 A1 out
14. with selectable menu items 1 graphical keys or buttons One menu item is configured to initiate a scan of an image using the scanning mechanism 212 Another menu item can be configured to perform the task of receiving input that includes a User ID a priority code and one or more e mail address es to which e mail message data is to be sent via interconnected network 104 Still another menu item can be configured to perform the task of initiating a retrieval of an e mail address that was previously stored in memory 206 where memory 206 can optionally contain e mail address information in the database and file codes storage 220 in memory 206 that can be requested to be displayed upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 When the e mail address information is retrieved from memory 206 the user can Oct 20 2005 select a displayed e mail address to which an e mail mes sage will be transmitted over interconnected network 104 to one or more recipients via server 106 i from the memory 206 of another digital transmitter device 102 as seen in FIG 1a Alternatively the user can directly enter a specific e mail address into the digital transmitter device 102 using touch sensitive menu screen 210 Controller 250 executes pro cesses resident in a communicative link interface for a transmission e g an e mail message that can be transmitted over a wired and or wireless link to interconnected network 104 These transmitted email messages need not
15. 37 wherein the bar code has a value corresponding to the object to be substi tuted 39 The method as defined in claim 33 wherein the rendering is selected from the group consisting of a print out facsimile transmission and an e mail message 40 A method of producing a document with a digital transmitter device wherein the document is based on a form template that incorporates a scanned image into a predefined insertion field the form template or parameters of said form template being stored in or accessible to said digital trans mitter device the method comprising scanning an image for inclusion in said form template said scanning being automatically performed in accor dance with a size or position of said predefined inser tion field validating the scanned image or representation thereof against an access control database such that when the validation for the scanned image is negative the method further comprising outputting a diagnostic reflecting the absence of validation of the scanned image and US 2005 0231746 A1 positive the method further comprises incorporating said scanned image into said form template at the predefined insertion field and outputting a rendering of the form template 41 The method as defined in claim 40 further comprising automatically shaping said scanned image in accordance with a shape of said predefined insertion field 42 The method as defined in claim 40 further comprising
16. 915 uses the input to access one or more databases so as to retrieve corresponding data These data can be the size shape and characteristics of insertion fields correspond ing to detectable indicia Other data that can be retrieved is one or more e mail addresses in a distribution list and or an US 2005 0231746 A1 optional text message to be sent with an e mail message By way of example and not by way of limitation database and file codes storage 220 224 respectively at the digital transmitter device 102 and at the server 106 can be used to retrieve these data 0105 Process 900 then passes control to step 916 where the process 900 waits until the image composer 217 of digital transmitter device 102 is ready to compose a modi fied scanned image of the document Once the image com poser 217 is ready process 900 moves to step 918 At step 918 the image composer component 217 of digital trans mitter device 102 can be executed in conjunction with scanning mechanism 212 to maintain data and or algo rithms software firmware or other process control means for composing documents with the corresponding insertion fields in the optically scanned documents The digital trans mitter device 102 executes image composer component 217 and or detection application 216 This execution inserts and or superimposes text symbols objects and or hand writing into the predetermined insertion fields that were determined to be in the document In
17. AN a wide area network WAN an intranet the Inter net or other similar network 0046 Local access to each digital transmitter device 102 i can be provided through an input device such as a touch sensitive menu screen on each digital transmitter device 102 i Auser accesses the input device via an access control process that is initiated by input that is made to a user interface This input can be a handwritten signature upon a touch sensitive menu screen a command sequence and or User ID entered via a keyboard as well as other means of input 0047 Following or prior to the access control process input to the user interface can be received in order to specify one or more e mail addresses and an optional message text for an e mail message that the user wishes to send Alter natively a default e mail address or a list of selectable e mail addresses can also be stored at each digital transmitter device 102 i Each digital transmitter device 102 i has an imaging or scanning mechanism to receive images of an object e g a hardcopy A document composer component in each digital transmitter device 102 i then composes images of the scanned object as discussed below The detection of detectable indicia in the scanned hardcopy is followed by the insertion of various text and or objects into respective insertion fields corresponding to the detectable indicia After these insertions a modified scanned image of the hardcopy is composed
18. T FIT TO FORM 822 IMAGE COMPOSER FORMS FILE OF CAPTURED IMAGE S RENDERED WITH INSERTION FIELD S 824 FAX PRINT AND OR TRANSMIT TO EMAIL ADDRESS ES WITH TEXT MESSAGE AND ATTACHED Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 s DIGITAL TRANSMITTER ROUTINE 904 Wait For Scanning Mechanism To Be Ready CAPTURE IMAGE AT SCANNING MECHANISM 906 910 908 is Detect X s Code s Yes DISPLAY PROMPT S FOR INSERTION S INTO DETECTED INDICIA FIELD S OPTIONAL FORM CODE 912 913 No DISPLAY DIAGNOSTIC Access Input 914 Yes USE INPUT TO ACCESS DATABASE RETRIEVE DATA 915 Sheet 8 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 P i Wait For image Composer To Be Ready nt INSERT SUPERIMPOSE INPUT TEXT SYMBOL HANDWRITING INTO PREDETERMINED INSERTION FIELD S OPTIONS No CROPPING OBJECT FIT TO FORM IMAGE COMPOSER FORMS FILE OF CAPTURED IMAGE S RENDERED WITH INSERTION FIELD S 924 X FAX PRINT AND OR TRANSMIT TO EMAIL ADDRESS ES WITH TEXT MESSAGE AND ATTACHED US 2005 0231746 A1 RENDERING WITH SUBSTITUTED VALIDATION INPUT FIELD OF THE INVENTION 0001 The present invention relates generally to periph eral devices and more particularly to a digital transmitter device for digitally collecting input used to validate and to substitute in a renderin
19. US 20050231746A1 a2 Patent Application Publication Pub No US 2005 0231746 Al as United States Parry et al 43 Pub Date Oct 20 2005 54 RENDERING WITH SUBSTITUTED VALIDATION INPUT 76 Inventors Travis J Parry Boise ID US Robert Sesek Meridian ID US Chad A Stevens Boise ID US Correspondence Address HEWLETT PACKARD COMPANY BOX 272400 3404 E HARMONY ROAD INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY ADMINISTRATION FORT COLLINS CO 80527 2400 US 21 Appl No 10 652 061 TO DIGITAL TRANSMITTER ROUTINE Wait For Scanning Mechanism To Be Ready Yes 804 806 N DISPLAY PROMPT USER ID OPTIONAL FORM CODE EMAIL ADDRESS ES TYPED TEXT MSG HANDWRITING ETC 808 No Receive Input 812 810 DISPLAY DIAGNOSTIC Use INPUT TO ACCESS DATABASE RETRIEVE DATA CAPTURE IMAGE AT SCANNING MECHANISM Detect A s Code s Yes 817 802 22 Filed Aug 29 2003 Publication Classification eint CE GOGF 15 00 59 TUS OU eL eee ce 358 1 13 57 ABSTRACT Predetermined indicia are detected in a digital image that is formed by optical scanning Alternatively or in addition a digital image can have a predefined insertion field Input and or an optically scanned image is substituted in the digital image for the predetermined indicia and or for the predefined insertion field The digital image having the substituti
20. a handwriting and or signature analysis algorithm This authentication can be used for any of several purposes including allowing the transmission to be sent as a job from the specific user 1 an unrecognized or otherwise invalid signature would be deemed to lack sufficient access rights to send the transmis sion as well as using the authentication as a form of a digital certification that would verify the user s identity similar to a digital badge 0110 Another exemplary authentication technique is to capture each transmitted signature for storage in a database The database provides an audit trail for later research by network security personnel if desired Additionally an originally stored reference signature such as that corre sponding to a particular User ID can be stored in a database for comparison to the transmitted signature in yet another form of audit trail that can be used for later research by network security personnel if desired The transmitted sig nature can be automatically compared to the reference signature or other characteristics thereof e g the speed at which all or a portion of the signature was signed to arrive at a statistical assessment of the differences and similarities there between One or more predetermined thresholds of these differences and similarities can be set and above which an alert can be transmitted to network security personnel for further evaluation as to authenticity These predete
21. a symbol to the hardcopy of the document To do so a softcopy of the document is Oct 20 2005 edited using a document processing application Then a hardcopy of the edited document is output for scanning In the interest of security any such modification of the docu ment may be required to be validated by an access control methodology prior to such modification and or the output ting of the edited document prior to a transmission thereof 0006 There is a need for a scanner based device such as a digital transmitter device that provides the security of user access control for modifications of a document at the scan ner based device without requiring the user to edit a soft copy of the document on another computing device SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 0007 In one implementation a digital transmitter device composes a digital image from an optically scanned image detects an input requirement receives the required input performs access control using the received input substitutes the received input or representation thereof in the digital image and renders the digital image 0008 In another implementation a digital transmitter device scans an image for inclusion in a document The document includes a form template that incorporates the scanned image in a predefined insertion field The form template or parameters thereof are stored in or accessible to the digital transmitter device An optical scanner of the digital tran
22. age further comprises detecting a symbol corresponding to the predetermined indicia in the digital image and the symbol represents the object to be substituted 8 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the substituting further comprises Oct 20 2005 determining a value for the detected predetermined indi cia and looking up the determined value in a table of values having objects respectively corresponding thereto in order to determine the object to be substituted 9 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the predetermined indicia are detected in the digital image at a portion thereof having a perimeter the object to be substituted has a predetermined size and shape and the substituting further comprises changing the predetermined size and shape of the object to be substituted into a size and shape not larger than the perimeter of the portion of the detected predetermined indicia and substituting the changed predetermined size and shape of the object for the detected predetermined indicia in the digital image 10 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the predetermined indicia is detected in the digital image at an indicia portion thereof and the substituting further comprises determining whether the indicia portion intersects any non blank region of the digital image and situating the object in the digital image such that the object does
23. ail message could review the superimposed images of the handwritten signature and or the User ID and if desired apply a validation process As a further alternative when the validation process or other access control check results in a negative validation of the handwritten signature and or the User ID the facsimile or the e mail message can still be sent and the rendered document attached to the e mail message may include a notation that the result of the access control check was negative 0040 The location of the access control information and related signature representation for each User ID on a network can be diverse For example a digital transmitter device can function independently so that each user s User ID and associated signature representation is maintained by the digital transmitter device As such the digital transmitter device would perform the access control check for each manually entered User ID and or signature Once performed the access control check would have ascertained the validity and or access rights of the user to use the digital transmitter device Given that the rights of the user are sufficient the US 2005 0231746 A1 digital transmitter device would be enabled to proceed with the sending of a facsimile to a facsimile telephone number or with the sending of an e mail message to an e mail address that was specified by the user As stated above the rights of a user to use the digital transmitter device can
24. an inquiry that is made to a location at which the user IDs are stored such as at a network device e g a server in communication with the digital transmitter device or the inquiry can be made at the digital transmitter device itself Alternatively an inquiry can use the User ID as the code for accessing a storage location to obtain a digital representation of a handwritten signature for comparison to the manually input signature that was captured by the digital transmitter device on the Oct 20 2005 touch sensitive menu screen Other identification criteria can also be used to ascertain signature validity such as the speed at which the signature is executed The storage location will preferably contain User ID access control information for each User ID on a particular network or for a particular digital transmitter device Alternatively the User ID access control information can contain the user ID and a respective representation of a signature for a plurality of digital trans mitter devices that are in communication with a common interconnected network 0037 The result of the access control check can be a negative result or a positive result The digital transmitter device can review the result If there is an invalid access control status e g negative result then the digital trans mitter device will display a diagnostic message or error code The user may then input a different User ID and or signature or marking to the dig
25. anned image As such the detectable indicia can be an ink that is visible upon application by a user to a paper document but becomes invisible to the human eye when the ink dries Nevertheless the dry ink is still detect able by the detection routine that is performed upon the optically scanned image Invisible ink may be selected as the desirable detectable indicia in that the original paper docu ment is not obscured by a user s markings The dry ink when invisible to the human eye can be detected when it exhibits a predetermined range of reflectance values or exhibits an inherent reflectivity property e g one or more wavelengths that can be found by the detection routine performed upon the optically scanned image The reflective property of the ink can be understood as a particular hue or color that is found within the optically scanned image by the detection routine The dry ink in another example may only be visible to the human eye when illuminated by a certain color of light such as a blue violet light As such the dry ink would only be detectable when illuminated by light of one or more predetermined ranges of wavelengths 0023 Alternatively the detectable indicia can be a bar code or other patterned indicia that can be detected within the optically scanned image by the detection routine Other detectable indicia are also contemplated any of which can be found by known detection routines performed upon an optically scann
26. as a document The composed document can then be output by digital transmitter device 102 i The output can be made by the document being printed out transmitted by a facsimile to a facsimile tele phone number or sent in a file attached to an e mail message that is addressed to the input default or selected e mail address es from digital transmitter device 102 i through interconnected network 104 to one or more e mail servers 106 i for the respective e mail address es input or specified by the user 0048 The user of digital transmitter device 102 i seen in FIG 1 can transmit message data to interconnected net work 104 by a wired or wireless link A wireless link can be through an Infrared IR data connection or other wireless US 2005 0231746 A1 data connections such as the Blue Tooth or 802 11 protocol The wireless link may be made through radio frequency RF or infra red IR data ports By way of example digital transmitter device 102 i can include the capabilities of a cordless handset telephone a cellular telephone a personal digital assistant PDA a pager a watch and the like any of which is also capable of transmitting data in a wireless manner wired link can be performed through a USB data connection a serial port connection a parallel port connec tion or via other known data transmission standards and modes The wired link may be implemented through stan dard category V cable Universal Serial Bus USB ca
27. as scanning and outputting that which was scanned By contrast devices such as desktop laptop and pocket PCs often provide multiple and varied means of input output such as a full screen display a keyboard a mouse speakers microphones Oct 20 2005 PCMCIA Personal Computer Memory Card International Association slots portable media drives and the like These devices are capable of performing multiple functions through executing various software applications such as word processing applications spreadsheet applications financial applications network browsers and network mes saging applications 0044 Various digital transmitter devices 102 i are seen in FIG 1a including a facsimile machine 102 3 a multifunc tional peripheral machine 102 2 with a printer device that can scan and print out a hardcopy or send an e mail message with an attached copy of the scanned hardcopy and a high volume copier 102 1 that includes the capabilities of print ing on substrates of varied composition binding collating folding stacking stapling stitching edge trimming and paginating 0045 Interconnecting network 104 is representative of or communication links either wired or wireless that are capable of carrying data between server s 106 i and other network resources in communication with intercon necting network 104 In certain exemplary implementations interconnecting network 104 includes a local area network L
28. be sent to another digital transmission device 102 i they may be sent to any device capable of receiving email 0063 The digital transmitter device can be configured such that the user can enter a command to initiate a scanning operation either before or after the user has obtained suffi cient access rights where the rights are based upon an access control check that is performed upon the user s manual input of data and or a signature at touch sensitive menu screen 210 Prior to the scanning operation the user places a document into a sheet feeder device associated with digital transmitter device 102 The sheet feeder device then physi cally feeds each sheet in the document to scanning mecha nism 212 CPU s 202 process software or other machine executable code stored in image composer 217 Alterna tively the user can place a single sheet or substrate on to a glass platen associated with digital transmitter device 102 The image composer 217 then generates a bit map or other output that is a digital representation of the scanned docu ment in a document composition process The bit map or other digital representation of the document is examined for the presence of detectable indicia and insertion fields cor responding thereto by execution of the detection application 216 and or other routines Text and or object s for each insertion field are obtained as described herein 0064 Once obtained the text and or objects are inserted into
29. ble or IEEE 1394 i link Lynx Fire Wire connection data ports As such digital transmitter device 102 i can transmit by one or both of a wireless or wired link Exemplary System for a Digital Transmitting Device in Communication with a Server 0049 A system 200 of FIG 2 includes digital transmitter device 102 as a network resource coupled by a wired or wireless link to interconnecting network 104 and to server 106 through interconnected network 104 As such FIG 2 illustrates an embodiment of the system 100 of FIG 1a in greater detail In accordance with still further aspects of the present invention digital transmitter device 102 may be included within a multiple function peripheral MFP device 300 As its name implies the MFP device 300 is configured to provide multiple functions In this example the functions provided by the MFP device 300 include those provided by digital transmitter device 102 as well as an optional printer device 310 Consequently the user of digital transmitter device 102 may also print out a hardcopy of any applicable portions of data stored scanned or otherwise acquired by digital transmitter device 102 0050 In general digital transmitter device 102 uses a controller 250 to execute a program that can be stored in an image composer 217 of a memory 206 Execution of the image composer 217 will compose a document from images that are captured by scanning the document using a scanning mechanism 212 A
30. ddress from a user at touch sensitive menu screen 210 or retrieves a list of stored e mail addresses by a look up that makes use of the user s input The list of e mail addresses can be displayed on touch sensitive menu screen 210 in a hierarchical list The list can be sorted alpha numerically The user can either select from among the displayed e mail addresses or input the characters of a specific e mail address using a drill down function of the menu as discussed below with respect to FIGS 3 4 The Oct 20 2005 drill down menu format and the displayed list of retrieved e mail addresses assist the user in locating an e mail address of interest 0070 FIG 2 shows server 106 as being in communica tion with interconnected network 104 and having a proces sor 232 a volatile memory 234 and memory 222 Memory 222 includes a device driver 228 a server module 230 optionally the database and file codes storage 224 discussed above and application routines 226 for storage of software or other machine executable code Application routines 226 are storage locations for programs that can be executed by processor 232 on server 106 One such routine is an access control routine that ascertains a user s privileges to use the digital transmitter device 102 based upon the input at touch menu screen 210 e g User ID and or manually input signature as was discussed above 0071 As mentioned in the examples above a user inter face device
31. detection application 216 in memory 206 can be used to detect detectable indicia in an optically scanned image to determine the size shape and location of insertion fields from the detected indicia and to determine a process for obtaining the text or objects to be inserted into each insertion field in the optically scanned image 0051 Input from a user and or the detected indicia can be used as a key to look up corresponding text or objects in database and file codes storage 220 in memory 206 of digital transmitter device 102 and or in database and file codes storage 224 in memory 222 of server 106 Text or objects thus obtained can then be used for any of a variety of purposes For instance the input from the user can be a User ID an access code a character string or a sequence of codes that can be looked upon the database and file codes storage 220 for the purpose of obtaining a single email address and or an e mail address list 0052 The detected indicia can be a bar code or invisible ink symbol that can be looked up in the database and file codes storage 220 This look up operation can obtain cor responding text and or objects These corresponding text and or objects can then be substituted into the corresponding insertion fields in a scanned hardcopy so as to take the place Oct 20 2005 of the detected indicia Other look ups are also contem plated such as particular patterns where different patterns could indicate
32. different types of insertions 0053 Upon obtaining the text and or objects the execu tion of the detection application 216 can also fit insert and or superimpose each such text or object into around and or proximal to the corresponding insertion field of the optically scanned image The image composer 217 can be used to compose a modified optically scanned version of the document containing the inserted text and or objects This modified optically scanned version of the document can then be output or rendered Alternatively the modified optically scanned version of the document can be composed and stored in full or in part locally in and or remotely to scanning mechanism 212 0054 Controller 250 can execute a program so as to transform data to a driver format suitable for printing with integral optional printer device 310 such as a mark up language format e g SMGL HTML or XML or such as a job language format e g PCL or POSTSCRIPT Printer device 310 can have the capability of converting data and then outputting it onto an appropriate print media such as paper transparencies or glossy photo paper 0055 Digital transmitter 102 includes one or more CPUs 202 each of which is operatively coupled to memory 206 and a user interface that includes an input device Preferably the input device will be locally accessible at digital trans mitter device 102 By way of example the input device can be a touch sensitive menu sc
33. ds have been determined as described above the digital transmitter device 102 displays prompts upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 There can be one or more prompts corresponding to each of the one or more predetermined insertion fields As discussed above each predetermined insertion field is to have text and or object s inserted therein where the text and or object s or repre sentations thereof will be input by the user such as by a scanning operation with scanning mechanism 212 by a keyboard or by other input device associated with digital transmitter device 102 0103 Input from a user is received and tested for validity at step 913 The validity test extends both to access control as well as compliance with expected input to corresponding insertion fields The test that controls access to the digital transmitter device corresponds to that which was discussed above with respect to step 810 of FIG 8 A test for a valid insertion to be made into the predetermined insertion fields can be based upon predetermined criteria for monitoring user input An invalid access attempt negative access con trol check or an invalid input for insertion will result in a diagnostic that is displayed at step 914 followed by a termination of process 900 at step 910 When valid input is received from the user and the user is granted access control rights process 900 moves to step 915 0104 When various acceptable inputs are made by the user step
34. ed image US 2005 0231746 A1 0024 As described above the detectable indicia is rep resentative of one or more insertion fields into which text or an object is to be inserted The detection routine once having determined the presence of detectable indicia in the optically scanned image will use the detected presence to determine various characteristics respectively of the one or more insertion fields These characteristics can include the number location size and shape of the one or more insertions fields For example a user can apply sticky bar code labels of different types to a piece of paper that is to be scanned Alternatively the user can also edit a softcopy of the document so as to include images of the bar codes or like detectable indicia 0025 The types of bar codes placed on the hardcopy or its corresponding softcopy by the user can have respectively different significance in subsequent processing A particular bar code that is detected by a detection routine may be interpreted as an instruction to prompt a user to input a code at a user interface of the digital transmitter device For instance the prompt may direct the user to physically input data from a keypad and or touch screen This input code would then be used to look up text and or one or more objects that are to be fit as a substitution for the detectable indicia into the corresponding insertion field The input code may also be used to ascertain a predeter
35. ein the predetermined range of reflectance values is detectable at the portion when the portion is illuminated by light having a predetermined range of wavelengths 25 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 22 wherein the means for detecting further comprises locating a portion of the digital image corresponding to the prede termined indicia wherein the portion includes a bar code 26 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 25 wherein the bar code has a value corresponding to the object to be substituted 27 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 22 wherein the means for outputting further comprises means for forming a network message to be transmitted wherein the network message includes the digital image and is addressed to an electronic address including an address of network resource and a destination location thereat 28 A digital transmitter device for producing documents based on a form template that incorporates a scanned image the digital transmitter device comprising processor an optical scanner controlled by said processor and a memory unit including an access control database and an access control program wherein US 2005 0231746 A1 the memory unit is accessible to said processor in which said form template or parameters of said form template are stored said form template including a predefined insertion field for accepting the scanned image wherein said processor con
36. er at a touch sensitive menu screen 210 of digital transmitter device 102 The form code corresponds to a form template that is kept in storage The storage can be local or remote to digital transmitter device 102 As such the digital transmitter device 102 addresses in particular the situation in which the user wishes to produce a printed document based on a predetermined electronic form or template that includes material textual or graphic that has been or will be scanned and is then incorporated into the document The completed document may be printed faxed transmitted electronically or stored electronically depending on the desires of the user and the capabilities of the digital trans mitter device 102 used to create the completed document In one implementation the form template for the document being generated is preferably stored on a hard drive or other memory device of the digital transmitter device 102 The form template however may be stored on at server 106 or another network resource and downloaded to the digital transmitter device 102 via network 104 0082 With the form template that corresponds to a form code in memory when scanned images are to be inserted into the template the digital transmitter device 102 can access the form template from the memory and ascertain the size and or position of one or more predefined insertion fields into which the scanned image s and or input from the user can be fit Alternatively
37. ertion fields 0087 The digital transmitter device 102 may then auto matically insert the two handwriting and address data images that were scanned into the corresponding predeter mined insertion fields 504 506 in the form template 502 The result is a completed form seen in FIG 7 with the scanned images incorporated into the appropriate fields 702 704 The completed document seen in FIG 7 can then be rendered by the digital transmitter device 102 for the user transmitted as a facsimile sent in an email attached docu ment file e g a PDF format to an email message or stored and or transmitted as an electronic document file In this way predefined insertion fields can be fitted with incorporated scanned images quickly Each scanned image in each predefined insertion field can be appropriately sized and perhaps shaped automatically The user need not take US 2005 0231746 A1 time to edit resize or crop a scanned image that is fitted into a predefined insertion field in a form template If the scanned image or its representation that is provided has a shape that does not match the predefined insertion field the digital transmitter device 102 will preferably size the scanned image to generally fit the predefined insertion field and then start at the center of the scanned image and crop from the scanned image an image of the appropriate shape to match the predefined insertion field 0088 Alternatively the digital transm
38. ess 800 passes control to back to step 806 If however the user has made input using the user interface at step 806 then the process moves to step 810 Alternatively if the user has entered a form code then the form code can be used to look up a form template The form template can be retrieve and found to have one or more predetermined insertion fields therein For instance a user can enter a form code which when looked up in a forms specification table file or other logical structure retrieves the form template and identifies specific locations therein that correspond to one or more predetermined insertion fields By way of non limiting example this lookup can find that predetermined insertion fields 504 and 506 in a form template that has the appearance at reference numeral 502 Further on in process 800 text and or objects can be scanned and or input for insertion into the predetermined insertion fields 504 and 506 0093 At step 810 an access control check is preformed upon the input made at step 806 By way of example the User ID 304 and the manually entered signature 608 seen in FIG 6 can be queried against the database and file code storage 220 and or 224 of either digital transmitter device 102 or server 106 This query can be used for example as access control check that determines whether or not the input User ID matches the manually entered signature This matching routine can be performed using known handwrit ing reco
39. evice e g handwriting received at a touch sensitive menu screen can be superimposed on around or near the image that has been composed or digitized As such the resultant appearance of the rendered documents sent in the e mail message will be that the handwriting or other indicia appears to be integral to or a part of the original images on the documents that were captured by the scanning mechanism 0035 Access Control to the Digital Transmitter Device 0036 A user can key in or input a user identification code ID prior after or simultaneous with the scanning of a document at a digital transmitter device The user can also use a pen or stylus upon a touch sensitive menu screen to mark a signature or other indicia of identity e g initials of the signer The digital transmitter device or other network device then performs one or more access control or vali dation processes against one or both of the User ID and the manually input signature The one or more processes are executed in order to determine whether or not the user has sufficient access rights to use the digital transmitter device Thus these processes can determine whether or not the user has access to various functionalities of the digital transmitter device including sending an email message to an e mail address specified by the user optical scanning copying faxing editing etc Execution of the one or more access control processes can be performed by use of
40. g BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 0002 Many peripherals to computer networks include a scanner component One example of such a peripheral is an All in one also known as a multifunction peripheral MFP in that it has the capability to perform the multiple functions of scanning hardcopy documents copying and printing Another example is a digital network copier that scans in documents from an automatic document feeder does high volume copying and has the capabilities of binding collating folding stacking stapling stitching edge trimming paginating and printing on substrates of varied composition Each of these peripherals when in communication with an interconnecting network can also be described as being a digital transmitter device A digital transmitter device typically has an input device e g a keyboard a display a scanner and an output device The output device of the digital transmitter device can be for sending a facsimile or an electronic mail message e mail A digital transmitter device need not have a printer 0003 In an exemplary scanning operation a hardcopy of document or other physical object can be presented to the scanner portion of a digital transmitter device After scan ning the digital transmitter device transforms the scanned image into a digital representation If the digital transmitter device has a printer the digital representation can be ren dered to the printer to produce one or more
41. gnition techniques such as those incorporating a comparison of the speed at which a signature is executed Other access control routines can also be used Such as the previously mentioned use of biometric identification If the access control check results in a denial of access e g other than a positive result from the access control check then a diagnostic message or error code is displayed to the user on the user interface at step 812 and the process 800 returns control to step 804 Other alternatives for a denial of access are contemplated The digital transmitted device 102 can be disabled as to further access and or an alert message can be transmitted from the digital transmitter device 102 with or without a rendering of the manually input signature being attached to the message If access is permitted then process 800 proceeds to step 814 0094 When various acceptable inputs are made by the user step 814 uses the input to access one or more databases so as to retrieve corresponding data These data can be the size shape and characteristics of insertion fields correspond ing to detectable indicia Other data that can be retrieved is one or more e mail addresses in a distribution list and or an optional text message to be sent with an e mail message By way of example and not by way of limitation database and file codes storage 220 224 respectively at the digital transmitter device 102 and at the server 106 can be used to retrie
42. hardcopies If the digital transmitter device has facsimile transmission capa bilities and a network over which to transmit a facsimile the digital transmitter device can render the digital representa tion of the scanned image into a facsimile image that can be transmitted over the network to a predetermined or input facsimile telephone number 0004 In an exemplary digital transmitting operation a hardcopy of a document or other physical object can be presented to the scanner portion of a digital transmitter device After scanning the digital transmitter device trans forms the scanned image into a digital representation that 15 then saved in a data format such as in a bit map data format or in a Portable Document Format PDF Electronic mes saging can be used to send an electronic mail e mail message from the digital transmitter device with an attach ment of the digitized representation in the data format The e mail message can be sent to recipients over an intercon necting network where the recipients have an e mail address that a user manually enters at the digital transmitter device or that a user specifies using a predefined list of recipient e mail addresses that can be stored in a memory of the digital transmitter device 0005 hardcopy of a document that is to be scanned may need to be modified so that the resultant scanned document will contain the modifications For instance a user may wish to add a text message or
43. he pen or stylus can also be used to make other inputs to menu screens 302 and 402 on touch sensitive menu screen 210 As can be seen in menu screen 602 the result of the manually entered signature is displayed Alter natively if digital transmitter device 102 and or server 106 perform an access control routine for which the result is negative menu screen 602 could display a diagnostic mes sage or error code showing a denial of access Oct 20 2005 0076 After input is accepted from the user of menu screen 602 the input can be used to look up data and object to be inserted into the two insertion fields that correspond to the first and second detectable indicia 504 506 The loca tion size and shape and any rule governing the same can also be looked up for the two insertion fields These data and objects can be found by look ups in one or both of database and file codes storage 220 224 respectively at digital transmitter device 102 and server 106 0077 Once the text and or objects are found by the look ups they can be inserted fitted into or otherwise superim posed into onto the size and shape of each of the two insertion fields by execution of the image composer 217 and or the detection application 216 An example of a resultant modified scanned image is seen in FIG 7 The modified scanned image shows a superimposed watermark handwritten signature 702 that has been substituted for the insertion field corresponding to firs
44. ield corresponding to the second detectable indicia 506 will be shifted in the position thereof such that the text on paper 502 will not be obscured by the filling in of the insertion field corresponding to the second detectable indicia 506 As such none of the text of paper 502 will be cropped or otherwise obscured by inserted text or objects One routine for performing such a cropping option is to shift the location of the insertion field corresponding to the second detectable indicia 506 such that the complete periph ery around the insertion field is represented only by a white color e g a blank space This completely white periphery can be detected by detection application 216 in the optically scanned image Other known routines to avoid obscuring and or cropping an underlying image with inserted text and objects are also contemplated 0075 The detection of first and second detectable indicia 504 506 is interpreted by the execution of detection appli cation 216 as an instruction to display the menu screen 602 seen in FIG 6 Menu screen 602 displays a prompt for the user to manually enter an alphanumeric address code 604 and a handwritten signature 608 The alphanumeric address code 604 can be entered on touch sensitive menu screen 210 as was the e mail address seen at 406 in menu screen 402 of in FIG 4 A handwritten signature 608 can be entered by using pen or stylus upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 Alternatively t
45. il address es input or otherwise designated by the user the bit map or other output that is a digital representation of the modified scanned image and can also include any message text entered by the user upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 The message data is then sent by a wired and or wireless link from digital transmitter device 102 to interconnected network 104 From interconnected network 104 a communication is established with an e mail server 106 as seen in FIG 1 The e mail server 106 serves the e mail address to which the e mail message from digital transmitter device 102 is to be sent By way of example server 106 can but need not function as the e mail server of any e mail address of digital transmitter devices 102 i seen in FIG 1 Alternatively a server in communication with interconnected network 104 other than server 106 can be the e mail server for e mail addresses associated with digital transmitter devices 102 i 0068 CPU s 202 is configured to perform the operations described above using various executable modules of memory 206 These executable modules of memory 206 can include an e mail address storage retrieval routine a com municative link interface routine and a user message com positing routine any of which can each be implemented in software and or firmware 0069 In one embodiment of the invention an e mail address storage retrieval routine executing on CPU s 202 receives input of an e mail a
46. ital transmitter device A user can attempt to gain access until the User ID and or signature are eventually validated or the operation of the digital transmitter device is frozen due to a predetermined number of failures in the attempts to gain access 0038 Upon validation or acceptance of the User ID and or signature the scanning mechanism initiates the scan ning process to optically capture the images on the docu ment The optically captured images including the manually input signature are subjected to a document composition routine at the digital transmitter device The document composition routine can be used to put the optically captured images into a data format that reflects the presence of and the integration with a superimposed rendering of the manu ally entered signature upon the hardcopy of the page that is rendered in the data format The superimposed signature will be fit by the document composition routine into one of the insertion fields that was identified by the presence of one or more fields at predetermined positions and or one or more fields of detectable indicia 0039 As an alternative the validation process or other access control check can be skipped In this case the process would proceed as described above by superimposing the manually entered signature and or the User ID on the rendered page in the data format by the document compo sition routine In this case the recipient of the facsimile or the e m
47. itter device 102 may rotate the image that is being scanned to better accom modate the size of the predefined insertion field Other more sophisticated means of reshaping scanned images may also be employed as understood by those of ordinary skill in the art Exemplary Embodiments of Digital Transmitter Device Capture of Substitutions for Predetermined Insertion Fields 0089 FIG 8 shows a flow diagram according to an embodiment of the present invention depicting a method for using a digital transmitter device With this in mind CPU s 202 can be configured to perform the operations described below By way of further example the flow diagram is depicted in FIG 8 to illustrate certain exemplary functions that can be performed using CPU s 202 and the other resources in digital transmitter device 102 Here a process 800 is provided 0090 FIG 8 shows process 800 beginning at step 802 which directs a process flow to step 804 At step 804 process 800 waits for the scanning mechanism 212 of the digital transmitter device 102 to be ready to perform a scanning operation When the scanning mechanism 212 is ready the process 800 moves control to step 806 At step 806 the digital transmitter device 102 displays a prompt upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 In order to display the prompt the server module 214 of memory 206 in digital transmitter device 102 can serve a menu page that is stored in memory 206 to CPU 202 for execution of scri
48. l trans mitter device 102 can be used in conjunction with scanning mechanism 212 to maintain data and or algorithms soft ware firmware or other process control means for compos ing documents with the corresponding insertion fields in the optically scanned documents 0097 After step 818 the digital transmitter device 102 is prepared to compose the scanned document Process 800 then proceeds to step 820 At step 820 the execution of image composer component 217 and or detection applica tion 216 of the digital transmitter device 102 inserts and or superimposes text symbols and or handwriting into the predetermined insertion fields that were determined as described above by the execution of detection application 216 0098 The completion of the insertion fields is made by a step 822 that permits various options Once such option permits the digital transmitter device 102 to be configured so as to permit or prevent one or more specific insertion fields from cropping the underlying portion of the optically scanned document as disclosed above e g the no crop ping option As a further option the size and or shape of the retrieved text and or objects and their corresponding insertion fields can be adjusted to fit one another within the given size and shape of the optically scanned document 0099 After optional step 822 process 800 performs step 824 through the execution of the image composer 217 by digital transmitter device
49. le of sequential menu pages that might be displayed on a touch sensitive menu screen of a digital transmitter device according to an embodiment of the present invention 0014 FIG 5 illustrates an example according to an embodiment of the present invention of a paper document to be optically scanned into a scanning mechanism of a US 2005 0231746 A1 digital transmitter device where the paper document has thereon one or more fields at predetermined positions and or one or more fields of detectable indicia 0015 FIG 6 illustrates an example according to an embodiment of the present invention of a menu page that might be displayed on the touch sensitive menu screen of the digital transmitter device in sequence after a transition from the menu page of FIG 4 where input to one or more fields are provided by a user where the one or more fields corresponds to the one or more fields on the paper document of FIG 5 0016 FIG 7 is a representation of the paper document of FIG 5 after it has been composed by the digital transmitter device where one of the fields on the paper document of FIG 5 has been substituted for a fitted field that includes a manually input signature that is superimposed as a water mark on the paper document where the other field on the paper document of FIG 5 has address and telephone num ber data fitted therein and situated so as to avoid clipping an adjacent marking on the paper document and where the
50. le telephone numbers transmitted to one or more electronic mail e mail addresses and or transmitted to one or more storage mediums 1 network share drives RAM memory 0021 The first implementation relates to the scanning of a hardcopy to produce an optically scanned image at a digital transmitter device The hardcopy has certain detectable indicia on its face This detectable indicia is representative of one or more insertion fields into which text or an object is to be inserted Scanning the hardcopy produces an opti cally scanned image The optically scanned image is exam ined for the presence of the detectable indicia corresponding to one or more insertion fields Detectable indicia deter mined to be present is further examined to determine the position size and shape of each of the one or more insertion fields Upon this determination respective text and or objects are fit into each of the one or more insertion fields to produce a modified scanned image The text and or objects are located identified and or retrieved using routines that call for interactive user input and or retrieval of data from a database based upon interactive user input such as where the user physically inputs data from a keypad and or touch screen 0022 The detectable indicia can be quite diverse in type and kind The type and kind of detectable indicia need only be detectable by a detection routine that is performed upon an optically sc
51. lication Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 3 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 04 Fig 5 302 User ID A Enter Command 1 Scan _ View Email Addresses 3 Enter Email Address Add Edit Email Addresses 1008 1004 1006 User ID AS3B Enter Email Address CSesek URL COM ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUZ12 3456789 COM NET CC GOV ORG Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 4 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 76 5 Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 5 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 6 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 Fig 7 I N af U NI PAN NV W yu ASD PPI 26 State St Erie OH 12345 555 123 4321 Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 bs DIGITAL TRANSMITTER ROUTINE Wait For Scanning Mechanism To Be Ready Yes 804 DisPLAY PROMPT USER ID OPTIONAL FORM CODE EMAIL ADDRESS ES TYPED TEXT MSG HANDWRITING ETC 806 808 No Receive Input 812 810 DISPLAY DIAGNOSTIC USE INPUT ACCESS DATABASE RETRIEVE DATA CAPTURE IMAGE AT SCANNING MECHANISM Detect Yes 817 Sheet 7 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 Fig f 818 Wait For Image Composer To Be Ready 820 Yes INSERT SUPERIMPOSE INPUT TEXT SYMBOL HANDWRITING INTO PREDETERMINED INSERTION FIELD S OPTIONS NO CROPPING OBJEC
52. mage can then be transmitted by e mail or by facsimile to a facsimile telephone number or it can then be rendered as a hardcopy to a printer or any combination of the forgoing 0032 network message can be transmitted so as to include the modified scanned image in a transmission of message data via an e mail message from the digital trans mitter device to one or more e mail address es When an e mail message is sent from a digital transmitter device message data including the modified scanned image can be attached to the e mail message 0033 The e mail message is sent from the digital trans mitter device to an electronic address including an address of a network resource and a destination location thereat The modified scanned image in the message data can be com posed from the digitized image that was captured by the scanning mechanism which digital image was modified by any insertion fields as described above The e mail address es can be anyone of an electronic mail e mail address at an e mail server on a network a file folder address at a server on a network a Web site address at a server on a network and the like 0034 The digitizing of the composition process for the message data can include handwriting or other indicia that was captured from a user s use of an input device such as a touch sensitive menu screen a keyboard etc One result of the composition or digitizing process is that the input from the input d
53. mined indicia composing at the digital transmitter device a digital image from the optically scanned image detecting with the digital transmitter device a portion of the optically scanned image at which the predetermined indicia is situated identifying with the digital transmitter device an object corresponding to the predetermined indicia performing a validation routine of the object against an access control database and when the validation routine returns a positive access result substituting the object or representation thereof into the digital image at the portion of the optically scanned image at which the predetermined indicia is situated and outputting at the digital transmitter device a rendering of the digital image 34 The method as defined in claim 33 wherein the outputting further comprises forming a network message that includes the rendering and that is addressed to an electronic address including an address of a network resource and a destination location thereat 35 The method as defined in claim 33 wherein the portion exhibits a predetermined range of reflectance values 36 The method as defined in claim 35 wherein the predetermined range of reflectance values is detectable at the portion when the portion is illuminated by light having a predetermined range of wavelengths 37 The method as defined in claim 33 wherein the portion includes a bar code 38 The method as defined in claim
54. mined shape and size of the insertion field Alternatively the input code might be used to retrieve a particular e mail address distribution list from a particular database so that an e mail message can be addressed to each of the e mail addresses along with an attached file containing the optically scanned image as modified by the inserted text and objects A different bar code that is detected by a detection routine may be inter preted as an instruction to prompt a user to make a hand written mark using a stylus on a touch sensitive menu screen of a user interface with the digital transmitter device The handwritten mark can be processed in a variety of ways include the fitting of the same into an insertion field of predetermined size at the location of the bar code in the optically scanned image The optically scanned image is modified so as to show the handwritten mark such as by obscuring the document beneath the handwritten mark or by watermarking the handwritten mark so that it does not obscure the document beneath the handwritten mark depending upon which bar code the user applied to the hardcopy 0026 In addition to or as an alternative to bar codes user can make marks or symbols on the hardcopy that is to be scanned such as with one or more types of non human visible inks such as the invisible ink described above For instance each ink can exhibit different inherent reflectivity properties e g a different wavelength A
55. mitter device one or more such pieces of paper can have an image an example of which has been discussed above with respect to FIG 5 After the document composition is performed by the digital transmitter device 102 each rendered page can have a representation such as has been discussed with respect to FIG 7 where a manually entered signature has been super imposed with an address and facsimile number also inserted into the image 0080 Whether one or all of the rendered pages are to show the handwritten superimposed entries can be an option that is left to the user who is placing the detectable indicia Alternatively the routines controlling the corresponding insertion fields with respect to the placement and appearance of the insertions upon the rendered page can control whether or not one or all of the rendered pages are to show the handwritten superimposed entries By way of example if the document composition process produces a PDF file from scanned documents a user that opens the PDF file with a US 2005 0231746 A1 PDF reader might see the handwriting superimposed on the rendering on all of the pages of the document in the PDF file Other data can be superimposed by the document compo sition component of the digital transmitter device such as the time date e mail address of the sender etc Of course data formats other than PDF as discussed above can be used by the image composer 0081 form code can be input by a us
56. n a second implementation a form code is communicated to the digital transmitter device The form code is used by the digital transmitter device to identify a form template that has one or more predetermined inser tion fields The user is prompted to enter the text and or objects or representations thereof that are to be respec tively inserted into the one or more predetermined insertion fields Alternatively the text and or objects or representa tions thereof can be optically scanned and then respectively inserted into the one or more predetermined insertion fields 0019 user enters input that is used as access control to operation of the digital transmitter device The input for instance can be physically entered by the user at an input device such as a keypad and or at a touch sensitive menu screen If access is granted based upon the input text and or Oct 20 2005 objects are retrieved The text and or objects can be directly entered as input to the digital transmitter device by the user Alternatively the input provided by the user can be used to perform a lookup in a table or other logical structure to retrieve the text and or objects 0020 The retrieved text and objects are inserted at the predetermined locations in the document in the optically scanned image to thereby produce a modified optically scanned image of the document The modified optically scanned image can be printed transmitted to one or more facsimi
57. n said form template US 2005 0231746 A1 in accordance with a size or position of said pre defined insertion field and a validation of the scanned image or representation thereof against an access control data base such that upon such validation the instructions further cause said scanning device to incorporate said scanned image into the predefined insertion field of the form template 14 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 13 wherein said instructions further cause the digital trans mitter device to receive input of an electronic address that includes an address of a network resource and a destination loca tion thereat output a rendering of the scanned image incorporated into the form template and form a transmission for transmitting a network message including the rendering from the digital transmitter device to the electronic address 15 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 13 wherein said instructions further cause the digital transmitter device to output a rendering of the scanned image incorporated into the form template and the rendering of the digital image is selected from the group consisting of a print out a facsimile transmission of the digital image an e mail message containing a representation of the digital file and an e mail message having a file attached thereto that contains a represen tation of the digital file 16 A digital transmitter device comprising mea
58. ng a validation routine of the handwriting image against an access control database and when the result of the validation routine is positive outputting a rendering of the digital image 2 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the composing further comprises transforming opti cally scanned images of one of more sheets of paper into the digital image wherein one of more sheets of paper were received from a sheet feeder at a scanning mechanism of the digital transmitter device 3 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the detecting further comprises locating a portion of the digital image corresponding to the predetermined indi cia wherein the portion exhibits a predetermined range of reflectance values 4 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 3 wherein the predetermined range of reflectance values is detectable at the portion when the portion is illuminated by light having a predetermined range of wavelengths 5 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the detecting further comprises locating a portion of the digital image corresponding to the predetermined indi cia wherein the portion includes a bar code 6 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 5 wherein the bar code has a value corresponding to the object to be substituted 7 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the detecting predetermined indicia in the digital im
59. not intersect a non blank region of the digital image 11 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the substituting further comprises receiving input of an electronic address and the outputting a rendering of the digital image further comprises forming a transmission for transmitting a network message including the digital image from the digital transmitter device to the electronic address including an address of a network resource and a destination location thereat 12 The computer readable medium as defined in claim 1 wherein the rendering of the digital image is selected from the group consisting of a print out a facsimile transmission of the digital image an e mail message containing a repre sentation of the digital file and an e mail message having a file attached thereto that contains a representation of the digital file 13 Computer readable instructions stored on a medium for recording computer readable instructions comprising instructions for causing a digital transmitter device to scan an image for inclusion in a document wherein said docu ment includes on a form template that incorporates said scanned image in a predefined insertion field the form template or parameters of said form template being stored in or accessible to said digital transmitter device wherein said computer readable instructions cause an optical scanner of said digital transmitter device to scan said image for inclusion i
60. ns for making input means for composing a digital image from an optically scanned image means for detecting predetermined indicia in the digital image means for substituting an object for the detected prede termined indicia in the digital image means for storing an access control database means for validating manual input received at the means for making input against the access control database means when the means for validating validates the manual input for making the object to be the manual input means when the means for validating does not validate the manual input for making the object to be a diag nostic reflecting the absence of validation of the manual input and means for outputting a rendering of the digital image 17 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 16 wherein the means for detecting further comprises means for locating a portion of the digital image corresponding to the predetermined indicia wherein the portion exhibits a pre determined range of reflectance values 18 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 17 wherein the predetermined range of reflectance values is Oct 20 2005 detectable at the portion when the portion is illuminated by light having a predetermined range of wavelengths 19 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 16 wherein the means for detecting further comprises locating portion of the digital image corresponding to the prede
61. on is rendered 818 Wait For Image Composer To Be Ready Yes 820 INSERT SUPERIMPOSE INPUT TEXT SYMBOU HANDWRITING INTO PREDETERMINED INSERTION FIELD S OPTIONS CROPPING OBJECT FiT To FORM 822 Y IMAGE COMPOSER FORMS FILE OF CAPTURED IMAGE S RENDERED WITH INSERTION FIELD S FAX PRINT AND OR TRANSMIT TO EMAIL ADDRESS ES WITH TEXT MESSAGE AND ATTACHED Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 1 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 102 1 VON Fig la NETWORK 104 102a E 102 1024 2 Fax E Mail amp Co S amp def Touch Senstive PY i send 5 mo p serson DO tuv 77 gt G9 2 9 m Patent Application Publication Oct 20 2005 Sheet 2 of 8 US 2005 0231746 A1 Fig 2 200 SERVER 106 d IER MEMORY 222 PROCESSOR DATABASE AND 232 Device DRIVER FILE CODES 228 224 VOLATILE MEMORY APPLICATION 234 SERVER MODULE ROUTINES 230 226 NETWORK 104 DIGITAL TRANSMITTER DEVICE 102 IMAGE DATABASE AND CPU COMPOSER FILE CODES 202 217 220 la Dewce DRIVER Mile VOLATILE MEMORY 215 204 218 SERVER MopuLE DETECTION APP 214 216 ToucH SENSITIVE MENU SCREEN 210 SCANNING MECHANISM 212 DEVICE ENGINE 208 wee we ew ee ee Se I Patent App
62. on volatile memory 206 e g ROM Flash Digital transmitter device 102 also includes a device engine 208 The touch sensitive menu screen 210 acts as a local user interface for digital transmitter device 102 by displaying menu pages and accepting user input based on selectable menu items dis US 2005 0231746 A1 played on the menu pages The touch sensitive menu screen 210 can be used to display a menu page that asks for and receives the input such as an e mail address to which to image data that is scanned with scanning mechanism 212 is to be transmitted in an e mail message via interconnected network 104 0059 Controller 250 processes data and manages device functions by controlling device engine 208 and by respond ing to input from touch sensitive menu screen 210 Device driver software in a device server can be stored in memory 206 and executed on CPU s 202 Memory 206 also includes server module 214 configured to serve menu documents to the touch sensitive menu screen 210 The server module 214 is a local server in the sense that it is present within the same digital transmitter device 102 to which it serves menu documents 0060 As mention above controller 250 can optionally include a User ID Signature File and Code component that is stored in the database and file codes storage 220 in memory 206 This User ID Signature File and Code com ponent would in turn be used to validate a user identification code User ID and a c
63. or inclusion in said form template said means for controlling said scanning means causing said scan ning means to automatically scan said image in accor dance with a size of said predefined insertion field means for storing an access control database means for validating the scanned image or representation thereof against the access control database means when the means for validating validates for outputting a rendering of the form template with the scanned image included therein and means when the means for validating does not validate for outputting a diagnostic 31 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 30 further comprising means for receiving input of an electronic address that includes an address of a network resource and a des tination location thereat and means for forming a transmission for transmitting a network message including the rendering from the digital transmitter device to the electronic address 32 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 30 wherein the rendering is selected from the group consisting of a print out a facsimile transmission of the digital image an e mail message containing a representation of the digital 16 Oct 20 2005 file and an e mail message having a file attached thereto that contains a representation of the digital file 33 A method comprising forming an optically scanned image at a digital transmitter device of media bearing predeter
64. orresponding digital representation of a signature for the purpose of ascertaining the access control rights of a user Alternatively server 106 can perform this function through a database and file codes storage 224 in memory 222 of server 106 0061 Menu documents stored in memory 206 can be interpreted by the server module 214 and are configured to display textual and graphical information as menu pages on the touch sensitive menu screen 210 The menu documents driving the menu pages can include script code that is associated with graphical keys The term script code is intended herein to mean any one of a variety of different code types Various kinds of code are contemplated By way of example and not by way of limitation the code can be implemented in embedded script code in firmware in a native code such as code or can be JAVA script The code can be written in JavaScript code that is interpreted and executed on a Java Virtual Machine JVM The code can also be written in other script code languages such as VBScript or Perl 0062 Selecting a menu item by pressing a graphical key on the touch sensitive menu screen 210 triggers an event which causes a virtual machine 218 to interpret and execute the script code associated with the selected graphi cal key The virtual machine 218 is a software module stored in memory 206 that executes on CPU s 202 to interpret and execute script code The script code can be associated
65. ould then be modified to fit the user s input into the size shape and position of the insertion field so as to create a modified scanned image The modified scanned image can then be rendered as a hardcopy upon which the user s input is seen Other output renderings are also con templated 0029 The user can mark one or more fields on the paper that is to be optically scanned The shapes of the marks made by the user and the types of ink used by the user can have respectively different significances in subsequent processing by various detection routines A particular mark that is detected by a detection routine may be interpreted as an instruction to prompt a user to input a code at a user interface of the digital transmitter device such as by using a keypad and or touch sensitive menu screen This input code can then be used to look up text and or objects that are to be fit into an insertion field of predetermined size at the location of the particular mark This or another input code might be used for the retrieval of a distribution list of e mail addresses from a particular database so that respective e mail messages can be addressed for the transmission thereto of the modified scanned image A different mark that is detected by a detection routine may be interpreted as an instruction to prompt a user to make a handwritten mark using a stylus on a touch sensitive menu screen of a user interface The handwritten mark can be processed in a va
66. predefined insertion fields 504 506 as they are defined in the form template 502 This request may be displayed on the user interface 210 on the digital transmitter device 102 Natu rally the user will be working directly with the digital transmitter device 102 to scan the desired images However the prompt s may be made with the connected server 106 0085 The user then scans the two 2 handwriting and address data images sequentially with the scanning mecha nism 212 of the digital transmitter device 102 The digital transmitter device 102 or server 106 may prompt the user when it is ready to scan the next image if more than one image is to be included in more than one predetermined insertion field in the form template 502 0086 As shown in FIG 5 having ascertained the size position and perhaps the shape of the predetermined inser tion fields 504 506 into which the scanned images will be placed the digital transmitter device 102 will scan the two 2 handwriting and address data images and output elec tronically the images seen in FIG 7 seen at 702 704 that are the right size and shape for the predefined insertion fields 504 506 and that have an appropriate resolution Optionally these images could be sized to fit the predefined insertion fields 504 506 with or without distortion 1 the images could be scanned at an appropriate scale or scanned at a standard scale and the cropped to fit the intended predefined ins
67. pt code The script code being executed by CPU 202 effects a function to be per formed by digital transmitter device 102 such as receiving input from a user that is entered upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 or the initiation of a function by the user depressing a function related virtual button that is displayed upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 The script code will preferably be executed in conjunction with an interpretation of the menu page Note that in certain implementations the menu page can be directly interpreted by script code execut ing on CPU 202 without any prior storage in menu docu ments in memory 206 or use of server module 214 in digital transmitter device 102 0091 The prompt at step 806 directs a user to enter various inputs upon a user interface to the digital transmitter device 102 By way of example such a user interface could be touch sensitive menu screen 210 of digital transmitter device 102 as seen in FIG 2 The input can be entries that include User ID and or a manually entered signature An entry can also be made for a form code as discussed above Other examples of input methods include biometric identi fication and employee badges 0092 After the entries of the user are accepted the entries are queried at step 808 At step 808 it can be Oct 20 2005 determined whether or not the user has made input to the user interface If the user has not made input to the user interface then the proc
68. reen 210 Digital transmitter device 102 also includes at least one communication port for interfacing with interconnecting network 104 through either wired or wireless link 0056 When included in MFP device 300 CPU s 202 would also be operatively coupled to printer device 310 for example CPU s 202 is representative of any hardware firmware and or software that is configured to perform certain functions associated with the operation of digital transmitter device 102 Hence as those skilled in the art will recognize CPU s 202 may include dedicated logic and or one or more processors configured in accord with software instructions for example 0057 Memory 206 is representative of any type of data storage mechanism that can be accessed by at least CPU s 202 Memory 206 may therefore include for example some form of random access memory RAM some form of read only memory ROM and or other like solid state data storage mechanism Memory 206 may include a magnetic and or optical data storage mechanism Scanning mecha nism 212 is representative of any optical scanner technology that may be employed to produce scanned object data upon scanning an object Such scanning technologies are well known The resulting scanned object data is provided to CPU 202 and or stored in memory 206 0058 Controller 250 of digital transmitter device 102 typically includes data processing unit or CPU 202 a volatile memory 204 ie RAM and a n
69. riety of ways as described herein 0030 The second implementation produces a document with a digital transmitter device The document 1s based on form template that incorporates a scanned image into a predefined insertion field The form template or parameters thereof is stored in or accessible to the digital transmitter device In the second implementation an image is scanned for inclusion in the form template The scan is automatically performed in accordance with a size or position of the predefined insertion field The scanned image or a repre sentation thereof is validated against an access control database When the validation for the scanned image is negative a diagnostic is output that reflects the absence of validation of the scanned image When the validation for the scanned image is positive the scanned image is incorporated into the form template at the predefined field and a rendering of the form template is output 0031 In the first or the second implementation once text and or objects have been inserted into corresponding pre determined insertion fields the resultant modified scanned image can be rendered as a hardcopy to a printer In an alternative implementation a user can be prompted at the digital transmitter device to input a code that is used to look up an e mail address or a facsimile telephone number to US 2005 0231746 A1 which the modified scanned image is to be transmitted The modified scanned i
70. rmined thresholds serve as a degree of match validation that can be quantified when transmitted or otherwise made available to network security personnel With respect to signed docu ments that relate to financial transactions and or confidential or sensitive communications relatively low thresholds might be set as compared to common documents to ensure substantial degree of match validation Signature valida tion techniques can be implemented such that the predeter mined thresholds can be set adjusted or removed as desired upon demand of network security personnel Other factors could be preconfigured into signature validation techniques to contribute to a calculus for arriving at values for the respective predetermined thresholds such as the electronic address to which a signed document is to be transmitted e g inside vs outside of a local intranet by the digital trans mitter device 0111 The foregoing Detailed Description has set forth an example of transmitting an e mail message from a digital transmitter device Embodiments of the present invention contemplate other types of data that can also be addressed and transmitted from a digital transmitter device to an electronic address including those now known and those yet to be developed As such and in addition to an e mail transmission embodiments of the present invention include transmission from a digital transmitter device to an elec tronic address that includes an
71. rocedure 0107 It is contemplated that processes 800 and 900 and other portions of the disclosure herein can be modified to enhance assurances as to the authenticity of a signature Several examples of authentication techniques follow Once such authentication technique for a signature can be an optical character recognition routine OCR that is per formed upon the signature that is input by a user at an input device of the digital transmitter device The result of the OCR can be compared against a database of stored signa tures to which access rights are accorded 0108 Another authentication technique can be applied to input that is not a user s signature Rather the user can input a password a personal identification number PIN a bio metric identification finger print retinal scan etc using an input device configured for receiving the same and or a Oct 20 2005 combination thereof Then the user could insert by making an input a previously entered and stored auto signature specific logo or other restricted or otherwise controlled access graphic text or object One of more of these could then be used as the basis of an access control check 0109 For email and facsimile transmissions to be sent from the digital transmitter device the digital signature can be authenticated by a routine executing at the digital trans mitter device or by a connected authentication service This authentication can be by use of
72. s scanned by scanning mechanism 212 A particular form code is input into digital transmitter device 102 that corresponds to form template 502 seen in FIG 5 Alternatively the user Oct 20 2005 may be presented with a menu of the form templates existing on the system and prompted to select one of the form templates This may all be done with user interface device 210 on digital transmitter device 102 or from the server 106 Once the form template is selected by the user that form template will be retrieved from the memory 206 of the digital transmitter device 102 If the process is being con trolled from the server 106 the form template may be downloaded to the digital transmitter device 102 via the connection to network 104 Alternatively parameters of the one or more predefined insertion fields for which the one or more images are to be scanned may be communicated to the digital transmitter device 102 from the server 106 In either event the digital transmitter device 102 will ascertain the number size and position of one or more predefined inser tion fields in the form template for which images are to be scanned The user can then begin scanning the images of the handwritten signature and the address data that are to be included in the predefined insertion fields of the form template Preferably the digital transmitter device 102 prompts the user by displaying a request that the user scan one or more pieces of paper for each of the
73. sent as a facsimile transmission to a facsimile telephone number specified by the user and or sent in an attached file to an e mail message that is transmitted to an e mail address es specified by the user Moreover the image composer 217 of memory 206 can provide the digital transmitter device 102 with the capability of performing a variety of document composition routines for a plurality of data formats These data formats include an American Standard Code for Information Interchange ASCIT format ted data format a word processor format a spread sheet data format a Portable Document Format PDF data format a slide show software data format such as the Power Point amp software data format from Microsoft Corporation of Red mond Wash USA a graphic image file format GIFF data format a tagged image file format TIFF data format a Joint Photographic Experts Group JPEG data format a bit map data format an optical character recognition OCR data format and or other forms of encoded data including e g encrypted data etc 0067 When the user enters a command displayed upon touch sensitive menu screen 210 to enter or retrieve an e mail address digital transmitter device 102 coordinates the input of the e mail address Controller 250 then executes a user message compositing routine which can be stored in memory 206 The user message compositing routine assembles message data The message data so assembled can include the e ma
74. smitter device scans the image for inclusion in the form template in accordance with a size or position of a predefined insertion field A validation of the scanned image or representation thereof is performed against an access control data Upon the validation the scanning device incorporates the scanned image into the predefined insertion field of the form template DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 0009 more complete understanding of the various implementations of the present invention may be had by reference to the following detailed description when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings wherein the same reference numbers are used throughout the drawings to reference like components and features and wherein 0010 FIG 1a is a block diagram according to an embodiment of the present invention depicting a computing and communication environment having various digital transmitter devices in a system environment suitable for providing local access to the digital transmitter devices 0011 FIG 1b is an example of a user interface accord ing to an embodiment of the present invention for a digital transmitter device in FIG 1a 0012 FIG 2 is a block diagram according to an embodi ment of the present invention illustrating a digital transmit ter device in communication through a wired or wireless link to an interconnecting network to which a server is also in communication 0013 FIGS 3 4 illustrate an examp
75. t detectable indicia 504 The superimposed watermark handwritten signature 702 reflects the handwritten signature 608 that was input to menu screen 602 A look up was performed on the alphanumeric address code 604 entered in menu screen 602 to obtain the address data 704 that is seen inserted into an insertion field corresponding to the second detectable indicia 506 A no cropping option has been used in the resultant modified scanned image in that the address data 704 is shifted to the right so as to avoid obscuring text in the image on the paper proximal to the reference numeral 706 in FIG 7 0078 The modified scanned image seen in FIG 7 can be printed out sent to the displayed facsimile telephone num ber 555 123 4321 for rendering and or made into a docu ment e g a PDF file that can be attached to an e mail message addressed to the e mail address CSTEVENS URL COM In transmitting an e mail mes sage after the foregoing input sequence from a user digital transmitter device 102 can use the execution of image composer 217 to compose all insertion fields with the scanned document s and then assemble message data to be sent in an e mail message through interconnecting network 104 to the e mail address es that was were selected or otherwise entered by the user as discussed above 0079 Before a user places one or more pieces of paper in a sheet feeder to be optically scanned with a scanning mechanism into a digital trans
76. the user such as a menu virtual item button 1002 seen in FIGS 3 4 and 6 0073 Before a user places one or more pieces of paper in a sheet feeder to be optically scanned with scanning mecha nism 212 into digital transmitter device 102 one such piece of paper 502 can have an image such as is seen in FIG 5 Of course the image is not required to be on a piece of paper Rather the image can be on a substrate or other image bearing surface The image seen on paper 502 has a double underlined heading and has text below the heading The text below the heading has a font a case a line spacing a text color a background color a foreground color a particular character spacing certain text effects an alignment for each line and each paragraph text shadowing and text shading A first detectable indicia 504 and a second detectable indicia 506 are seen in the image on paper 502 As discussed above such indicia can be any shape or symbol that is detectable by execution of a detection application 216 upon the optically scanned image by digital transmitter 102 As such the first and second detectable indicia 504 506 can be for example bar codes invisible ink visible ink symbols hole punch sequences etc 0074 Reference numeral 508 points to a portion of the image on paper 502 where second detectable indicia 506 overlaps with text in the image on paper 502 The digital transmitter device 102 can be configured such that an insertion f
77. trols said scanner to scan an image for inclusion in said form template said processor controlling said scanner to automati cally scan said image in accordance with a size or position of the predefined insertion field and the processor executes the access control program to validate the scanned image or representation thereof against the access control database such that when the validation for the scanned image is negative output a diagnostic reflecting the absence of validation and positive output a rendering of the digital image that includes the scanned image inserted into the pre defined insertion field 29 The digital transmitter device as defined in claim 28 wherein the processor executes a program to form a network message to be transmitted to an electronic address that includes an address of a network resource and a destination location thereat and wherein the network message includes the rendering of the digital image that includes the scanned image inserted into the predefined insertion field 30 A digital transmitter device for producing documents that incorporate scanned images based on a form template the digital transmitter device comprising an optical scanning means memory means in which said form template or parameters of said form template are stored said form template including a predefined insertion field for accepting a scanned image means for controlling said scanning means to scan an image f
78. ts option 1 on menu screen 302 digital transmitter 102 activates scanning mechanism 212 to scan in documents as discussed above When the user selected option 3 on menu screen 302 menu screen 402 seen in FIG 4 is displayed Menu screen 402 can be used to receive input from the user The user can directly enter each character of a desired e mail address using displayed virtual buttons Menu screen 402 shows a practical example of a user selecting characters for a desired e mail address Script code executing in CPU s 202 can be used to present menu screen 402 The execution of this script code allows the user to see alphabetic and symbolic characters as the user depresses virtual buttons 1004 so as to move forward and backward through a displayed hierarchical list of available alphabetic and symbolic characters Script code executes in CPU s 202 to enable a user to select a displayed character by depressing virtual button 1006 Output area 406 on menu screen 402 shows that the user has entered various letters and symbols for the e mail address CSTEVENS URL COM Then when the Select vir tual button 1006 is depressed on touch sensitive menu screen US 2005 0231746 A1 210 as represented by menu screen 402 the user sees a transition to a menu screen 602 in FIG 6 Other virtual buttons on the touch sensitive menu screen 210 are also contemplated in order to provide for the initiation of other and or additional functions by
79. ve these data 0095 Process 800 then passes control to step 816 where the scanning mechanism scans in the document for storage at the digital transmitter device At step 817 the execution of detection application 216 locates detectable indicia in the optically scanned image of the document as discussed above When an insufficient detection results process 800 displays corresponding diagnostics at step 812 and return is made to step 804 Alternatively step 817 can be skipped where the user previously entered a form code that is used US 2005 0231746 A1 at step 808 to retrieve a form template and its corresponding predetermined insertion fields As discussed above the predetermined insertion fields can be determined by use of input of a form code that corresponds to a form template that has the predetermined insertion fields or by the detection of detectable indicia in an optically scanned page that corre sponds to the predetermined insertion fields Once the pre determined insertion fields are known text and or objects or representations thereof are inserted into predetermined insertion fields by scanning and fitting the same and or by input received from the user 0096 After step 817 is acceptable process 800 passes control to step 818 where process 800 waits for image composer component 217 and or CPU s 202 of the digital transmitter device 102 to be ready to compose the scanned document Image composer component 217 of digita

Rendering with substituted validation input

Contents

Download Pdf Manuals

Related Search

Related Contents