Image sharing

• US 8,266,241 B1
• Filed: 06/22/2004
• Issued: 09/11/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/22/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Neubrand, Hans-Werner, Subramanian, Baskaran
• Primary Examiner(s): Neurauter, George C
• Application Number:
  US10/873,822
• Time in Patent Office: 3,003 Days
• Field of Search: 709217-219, 719/321
• US Class Current: 709/217
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/541 Client-server
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/54 Interprogram communication

Abstract

A method, apparatus, and system for performing image sharing. A first computer is coupled to an external device capable of acquiring data. A second computer is coupled to the first computer. A direct access to data acquired by the external device is provided to the second computer.

Claims

1. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing a first image capture module for execution on a first computing device, the first image capture module comprising:

a first set of instructions for interfacing with a plurality of device drivers in order to control a plurality of image capture devices coupled to the first computing device, the plurality of image capture devices comprising at least a camera and an image scanning device;

a second set of instructions for establishing a communication link with a second image capture module of a second computing device, said second image capture module for controlling a third image capture device coupled to the second computing device;

a third set of instructions for allowing the second image capture module of the second computing device to control the camera through the established communication link;

a fourth set of instructions for controlling the third image capture device through the second image capture module;

a fifth set of instructions for interfacing with each of a plurality of client applications executing on the first computing device, said fifth set of instructions allowing each client application to control the plurality of image capture devices through the first image capture module and the device drivers without any client application being required to be directly operable with any of the device drivers.

2. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first computing device is a computer with a first operating system and the second computing device is a computer with a second, different operating system, and said communications link with the second image capture module is through a network.

3. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the third set of instructions comprises set of instructions for allowing the second image capture module to retrieve a set of images captured by the camera.

4. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 3, wherein said images are high-resolution images.

5. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 3, wherein said images are still images.

6. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the second computing device can only access the camera through the first computing device.

7. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the third set of instructions comprises set of instructions for allowing the second image capture module to command the camera to acquire image data.

8. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the second set of instructions is further for establishing a second communication link with a third image capture module of a third computing device and the third set of instructions is further for allowing the third image capture module of the third computing device to control the camera through the second communication link.

9. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first image capture module is part of an operating system for the first computing device.

10. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 9, wherein the operating system comprises a set of instructions for building at least a part of each of the plurality of client applications, the client applications for controlling the camera through the first image capture module.

11. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the client applications are further for controlling the image scanning device through the first image capture module.

12. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first image capture module further comprises a sixth set of instructions for allowing the second computing device to download a set of images captured by the camera through the established communication link without first downloading the set of images to the first computing device.

13. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 12, wherein the second computing device can only access the camera through the first image capture module.

14. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein said communication link is through at least one of a network connection and an Internet connection.

15. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the fifth set of instructions comprises a set of APIs for use by the client applications to control the image capture devices.

16. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein the first image capture module further comprises a sixth set of instructions for allowing the second computing device to download, from the camera through the established communications link, a set of images captured by the camera, wherein the second computing device only couples to the camera through the first computing device.

17. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the camera is coupled directly to the first computing device.

18. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the camera is coupled wirelessly to the first computing device.

19. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 1, wherein said first image capture module further comprises:

a sixth set of instructions for connecting to a plurality of browsers operating on a plurality of remote computing devices in order for the browsers to send commands to and receive data from the plurality of image capture devices through the device drivers.

20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the sixth set of instructions comprises a set of instructions for connecting to the plurality of browsers through an image capture server module.

21. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein a first image capture device is connected directly to the first computing device and a second image capture device is connected wirelessly to the first computing device.

22. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the first image capture module enables a first browser operating on a first remote computing device to access a first image capture device at the same time that a second browser operating on a second remote computing device accesses a second image capture device.

27. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein said local image capture devices comprise at least one of a scanning device, a cellular or wireless phone, a personal communication device, a personal data assistant, a memory card reader, and a camera.

23. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing an image capture module for execution on a local computing device that communicatively couples to a remote computing device, the image capture module comprising:

a first set of instructions for interfacing with a plurality of device drivers in order to control a plurality of local image capture devices, at least one of which is connected to the local computing device through a wireless connection or a network connection;

a second set of instructions for interfacing with the remote computing device in order to (i) receive commands to control the local image capture device devices from the remote computing device and (ii) send commands to control a remote image capture device that is connected to the remote computing device through a wireless connection or a network connection; and

a third set of instructions for interfacing with each of a plurality of client applications executing on the local computing device, said third set of instructions allowing each client application to control the plurality of local image capture devices through the image capture module and the device drivers without any client application being required to be directly operable with any of the device drivers.

24. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 23, wherein a second image capture module executes on the remote computing device and sends the commands to control the local image capture device.

25. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 23, wherein the remote computing device is a first remote computing device, the second set of instructions further for interfacing with a second remote computing device that communicatively couples to the local computing device, in order to receive commands to control the local image capture device from the second remote computing device.

26. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 25, wherein the first and second remote computing devices can only access the local image capture device through the image capture module.

28. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 23, wherein said local computing device is a server computer.

29. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 28, wherein said remote computing device is a client computer.