The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jun. 16, 1998
Filed:
Mar. 31, 1994
Ronald C Murray, Redmond, WA (US);
Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
Methods of recognizing rules, solid lines or rectangles, in a bit-mapped image and of using those rules to enable a suitable printer or other suitable device to receive the bit-mapped image quickly. In a preferred embodiment, the methods include the steps of recognizing rules, forming rule descriptors for the rules, and then transmitting the rule descriptors to the receiving device. Vertical rules are recognized by partitioning the bit-mapped image into a plurality of adjacent horizontal stripes of row data, dividing that horizontal stripe into data columns formed from vertically aligned row data bits, and ANDing the data bits in each vertically aligned column to identify, by a HIGH output from the AND function, vertical lines which span the horizontal stripe. Adjacent or continuous vertical lines are then identified. Horizontal rules are identified by dividing the row data into bytes, ANDing individual bits of each byte together, and recognizing a horizontal line by a HIGH output from the AND function. Adjacent horizontal lines are identified and combined. Horizontal rule descriptors are then formed and sent to the printer or other receiving device.