SYSTEM AND METHOD TO AUTOMATICALLY DISCRIMINATE BETWEEN DIFFERENT DATA TYPES

• US 20120308091A1
• Filed: 06/11/2012
• Published: 12/06/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 10/05/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hand Held Products Incorporated (Honeywell International Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Hand Held Products Incorporated (Honeywell International Inc.)
• Inventors: Wang, Ynjiun
• Granted Patent: US 8,636,224 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/118
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 19/06028 using bar codes
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 19/06037 multi-dimensional coding
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/0004 Hybrid readers
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10 by electromagnetic radiation, e.g. optical sensing; by corpuscular radiation
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10722 Photodetector array or CCD scanning
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10881 constructional details of hand-held scanners
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/1413 1D bar codes
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/1417 2D bar codes
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/22 by selection of a specific region containing or referencing a pattern; Locating or processing of specific regions to guide the detection or recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/413 Classification of content, e.g. text, photographs or tables
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/30 Writer recognition; Reading and verifying signatures
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 2209/41 with means for the generation of identity documents
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/257 electronically G07C9/26 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/26 using a biometric sensor integrated in the pass
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/28 the pass enabling tracking or indicating presence

Abstract

There is described a system and method for automatically discriminating between different types of data with an image reader. In brief overview of one embodiment, the automatic discrimination feature of the present image reader allows a human operator to aim a hand held image reader at a target that can contain a dataform and actuate the image reader. An autodiscrimination module in the image reader in one embodiment analyzes image data representative of the target and determines a type of data represented in the image data.

Claims

1. An image reader that automatically discriminates between data types, the image reader comprising:

an image collection module configured to collect image data representative of a target;

an autodiscrimination module in communication with the image collection module, the autodiscrimination module configured to automatically discriminate between a biometric and a dataform; and

an I/O module in communication with at least the autodiscrimination module.

2. The image reader of claim 1, comprising a hand held housing enclosing the image collection module.

3. The image reader of claim 1, comprising a manually activated trigger for initiating operation of the image collection module.

4. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein said autodiscrimination module comprises:

a dataform decoder module; and

an image processing and analysis module configured to perform a texture analysis of the image data and configured to classify the image data in response to the texture analysis.

5. The image reader according to claim 4, wherein the autodiscrimination module is configured to automatically discriminate between a signature a biometric and a dataform, and wherein the texture analysis includes testing the image data for characteristics indicative of a signature.

6. The image reader according to claim 5, wherein testing the image data for characteristics indicative of a signature includes at least testing the image data for the presence of curved elements.

7. The image reader according to claim 4, wherein the image processing and analysis module is configured to respond to a failure of the dataform decoder module to decode the image data.

8. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the dataform decoder module is configured to execute a one dimensional barcode decoding algorithm.

9. The image reader according to claim 8, wherein the one dimensional barcode decoding algorithm is configured to decode at least UPC barcodes.

10. The image reader according to claim 1, further comprising:

a housing configured to be hand held and oriented by a human operator, the housing enclosing the autodiscrimination module, the image collection module, and the I/O module; and

a trigger configured to be actuated to initiate the operation of the autodiscrimination module and the image collection module.

11. The image reader according to claim 1, further comprising a housing configured to be attached to a surface, the housing enclosing the autodiscrimination module, the image collection module, and the output module, the housing when attached to the surface designed to orient the image collection module towards objects containing targets to be imaged by the image collection module.

12. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the autodiscrimination module, the image collection module and the output module are implemented in a combination of hardware and software.

13. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the autodiscrimination module is configured to automatically discriminate between a signature a biometric and a dataform.

14. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the biometric is a facial image.

15. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the image collection module comprises a CMOS array.

16. The image reader according to claim 1, wherein the autodiscrimination module includes a feature extraction module and a generalized classifier module.

17. The image reader according to claim 16, wherein the autodiscrimination module includes a dataform decode module.

18. The image reader according to claim 16, wherein the feature extraction module includes a convolution module.

19. The image reader according to claim 16, wherein the generalized classifier module employs a neural network and receives data from the feature extraction module.

20. The image reader of according to claim 19, wherein the generalized classifier module specifies whether image data contains a biometric.