Patent Application
20080279454
It is common-place for people to exchange business cards. Managing the information on business cards one receives from other people can be tedious. One might attempt to manually enter the information from business cards (e.g., name, phone number, etc.) into a database of such information. This manual data-entry process can be time consuming and tedious.
For a detailed description of exemplary embodiments of the invention, reference will now be made to the accompanying drawings in which:
Certain terms are used throughout the following description and claims to refer to particular system components. As one skilled in the art will appreciate, computer companies may refer to a component by different names. This document does not intend to distinguish between components that differ in name but not function. In the following discussion and in the claims, the terms “including” and “comprising” are used in an open-ended fashion, and thus should be interpreted to mean “including, but not limited to . . . .” Also, the term “couple” or “couples” is intended to mean either an indirect, direct, optical or wireless electrical connection. Thus, if a first device couples to a second device, that connection may be through a direct electrical connection, through an indirect electrical connection via other devices and connections, through an optical electrical connection, or through a wireless electrical connection.
Referring to
The housing 12 comprises an input device 20, such as a keyboard. The housing 12 also comprises a touch pad 32 and one or more selection devices (e.g., buttons). The housing 12 comprises a front surface 24 that faces a user when the user is seated in front of the system 10.
In accordance with various embodiments, the front surface 24 comprises a slot 30 into which a printed paper item can be inserted by a user.
In accordance with various embodiments, the printed paper item 40 may comprise a business card or other type of printed item comprising information that the user wishes to have stored on or by system 10. Once the printed paper item 40 is at least partially inserted into slot 30 in the front surface 24 of the housing 12, the user partially lowers the display lid 14 towards a closed position to thereby enable camera 18 to acquire an image of the text on the printed paper item 40. In various embodiments, the display lid 14 need is not completely closed to acquire the image. Once the camera 18 has acquired the image of the text on the printed paper item 40, logic in the system 10 performs optical character recognition on the acquired image to obtain information such as a person's name, organization name, telephone number, email address, mailing address, etc. from the printed paper item 40. Some or all of such information is then stored in a database which, for example, may be internal to the system 10. An example of such a database comprises a “contacts” database such as is provided in various email programs.
In accordance with various embodiments, camera 18 is capable of performing an auto-focus process. Once the user begins lowering the display lid 14, the camera begins to achieve auto-focus on the printed paper item 40. The camera 18 and slot 30 are positioned in system 10 such that as the display lid 14 is lowered, the camera 18 faces the printed paper item as indicated by arrow 21 in
When lowering the display lid 14 towards the closed position, the camera 18 eventually will achieve auto-focus. Because the display lid 14 has been partially closed, it may not be readily easy or even possible for the user to view the display 16 in the display lid 14 while lowering the lid 14. For this reason, an indicator 25 is provided on a top surface 26 of the display lid 14 to provide feed back to the user when the camera 18 has achieved auto-focus. In some embodiments, the indicator 25 comprises a light emitting diode (LED), while in other embodiments the indicator 25 may comprise a visual indicator other than a LED. In yet other embodiments, the indicator 25 may comprise an audible indicator. Once auto-focus is achieved, logic internal to the system 10 illuminates the indicator 25. The indicator 25 indicates to the user that the camera 18 has achieved auto-focus and thus that the user should leave the display lid 14 at the location at which the auto-focus was achieved.
Once the user has lowered the display lid 14 to the point in which the camera 18 has achieved auto-focus, the camera 18 acquires an image of the printed paper item 40. In some embodiments, the camera 18 automatically acquires the image (i.e., the user need not manually force the image acquisition to occur). An optical character recognition process is then performed on the image with the resulting data being stored in a database as discussed above.
In various embodiments, camera 18 comprises a digital camera. In such embodiments, the system 10 produces an audible noise to simulate the noise produced by an analog camera taking a picture. In other embodiments, other types of user feedback is provided to indicate to the user when the image has been acquired.
If desired, a user may remove the printed paper item 40 from slot 30 and insert another printed paper item 40 into the slot. The auto-focus mechanism within system 10 detects a lack of focus when the user is removing the printed paper item 40 and inserting a new printed paper item 40. Once the auto-focus mechanism achieves auto-focus yet again, the system 10 acquires an image of the newly inserted printed paper item 40 and performs the optical character recognition and storage process again. In this way, the user can perform optical character recognition on one or more paper printed paper items as desired. Once imaging, optical character recognition and data storage of the printed paper items 40 have been completed, the user can close the display lid 14 or rotate the display lid 14 back to its fully opened position to continue using the system 10 in accordance with the desires of the user.
Referring again to
A spring member 60 is also provided in the slot 30. The spring member is held in place by a flange 58 formed as part of member 50. The spring member 60 is curved and is positioned about stop member 54 as shown. A curved portion 61 is formed in spring member 60 within slot 30. When a printed paper item 40 is slid in to slot 30, the curved portion 61 presses down on a printed paper item 40 to retain a printed paper item 40 in slot 30. The spring constant associated with curved portion 61 is not so great that the printed paper item 40 cannot be readily inserted into slot 30 but is large enough in accordance with various embodiments to push down on printed paper item 40 to retain the printed paper item 40 in the slot and help to retain the printed paper item 40 in a rigid or semi-rigid orientation to be imaged.
Storage 102 comprises volatile memory (e.g., random access memory), non-volatile storage (e.g., hard disk drive, flash memory, read-only memory, etc.) and combinations thereof. As shown in
The optical character recognition process functions regardless of the orientation of the lettering on the printed paper item 40. Thus, in some embodiments, the printed paper item 40 is inserted into slot 30 such that the text is “upside down” in viewed by a user seated in front of system 10. In other embodiments, the printed paper item is inserted into slot 30 such that the text is “right-side up” when viewed from the vantage point of a user seated in front of system 10.
The above discussion is meant to be illustrative of the principles and various embodiments of the present invention. Numerous variations and modifications will become apparent to those skilled in the art once the above disclosure is fully appreciated. It is intended that the following claims be interpreted to embrace all such variations and modifications.
