Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

John C Bowler

Gilman Kuey Wong

Feng Yue

Hock San Lee

J Andrew Goossen

Philippe Bossut

J Andrew Goosen

An image passthrough extension structure and method facilitating the transfer of compressed data image files from a software application to a device via the computer system operating system. The application determines whether the device is capable of decoding the specific compressed data file by polling the device driver. If the driver returns a 'no support' message, the application processes the compressed data file in a conventional manner. If the driver returns a 'support' message, the application transfers the compressed data file, along with the additional processing information, to the device driver utilizing the conventional file transfer operating system data structures modified to incorporate the compressed data file passthrough function. By allowing an application to transfer a compressed image file directly to a device driver, the present invention improves image fidelity and improves overall computer system efficiency by reducing the size of data files transferred between the application, the operating system and the hardware device.

System and method for transferring a compressed data file to a peripheral device

The present invention operates as an expert system to automatically determine an optimal method for reducing the size of an electronic file containing at least one embedded image by determining optimal methods for compressing each image. Further, in one embodiment, linked images are also compressed. User control of relevant parameters such as image compression options, retention or removal of unnecessary data associated with embedded or linked images, and downsampling images to better match the output resolution of specific output devices is provided in further embodiments. Further, to prevent cumulative degradation of images through repeated lossy compression, images that have already been compressed or optimized are preferably flagged so that they are not compressed more than once.

Determining optimal image compression methods for reducing file size

Growing community of inventors

Cave Junction, OR, United States of America

John C Bowler