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:
Jul. 24, 2001
Filed:
Feb. 01, 1996
James C. Zandee, Santa Clara, CA (US);
Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);
Abstract
A printer driver, for example a QuickDraw printer driver, keeps track of changes in a drawing environment (specified by a GrafPort) by saving State records. Rather than filling up the State with the contents of each pattern and clip region, references to each of these members are stored in the State. This referencing allows each component of a State to be saved separately while still allowing the State to be reproduced precisely when it is time to draw. Referencing can greatly reduce disk accesses and file size, thereby accelerating printing. Referencing also allows significant time to be saved during state comparison. Whereas previous drivers have required a State to GrafPort comparison at translation (drawing) time, in the present method, each reference in the current state may be compared with references from the previous state to see which fields have changed. Comparing references, which may be stored in four bytes, is much faster than comparing large patterns and regions.