Abstract: A lossless image streaming system for the transmission of images over a communication network. The system eliminates the necessity to store a compressed version of the original image, by losslessly streaming ROI data using the original stored image. The imaging system also avoids the computationally intensive task of compression of the full image. When a user wishes to interact with a remote image, the imaging client generates and sends a ROI request list to the imaging server. The request list can be ordered according to the particular progressive mode selected (e.g., progressive by quality, resolution or spatial order). The imaging server performs a fast preprocessing step in near real time after which it can respond to any ROI requests in near real time. When a ROI request arrives at the server, a sophisticated progressive image encoding algorithm is performed, but not for the full image. Instead, the encoding algorithm is performed only for the ROI.

Abstract: A system for collaborative document annotation whereby notes (i.e. annotations) associated with a document, such as an image or text document, are stored in a notes database on a central notes server. The documents and associated annotations are treated independently from each other whereby separate data structures are created for the documents and for the associated annotations. A web server application on the server side functions to capture requests from one or more note client applications for creating, storing, editing and retrieving annotations related to specific documents stored on the notes server. On the client side, the notes client functions to display the document that the user wishes to annotate and provides the tools necessary to permit the user to create, edit, delete, retrieve and store notes. A synchronization process transmits the annotations generated by the user from the notes client to the notes server.