Abstract: A system and method for an all-inclusive, high speed and convenient delivery of digital content to a user is described. The system and method include software, firmware and communications technology for providing digital content to a user, monitoring and controlling an interface between the user and the system to provide for purchase or lease of digital content by the user as well as communicating and archiving all data necessary to accommodate accounting, billing and reporting functions. The system and method also provide for management of the assignment of digital rights management so as to allow rendering of the digital content on more than one device, and to allow the content to be rendered on a device that is not connected to a digital rights license management server.

Abstract: A member unique name (MUN) system and MUN translation system and method are provided. The MUN system comprises a dimension reference for defining the context in which the remaining portions of the MUN exist and a canonical business key for uniquely identifying a member across different dimensional data sources within a business enterprise. The MUN translation system comprises a translation selection module for selecting a MUN transformation and a collection of MUN transformations for transforming a MUN of a first data source into a MUN of the second data source.

Abstract: A management information generating section generates management information in which the correspondence between content data and rights data is described when a digital DCF container containing encrypted content data and a rights object described in association with a right which decrypt the content data are stored in an external media card. A backup section writes the DCF container, rights object and management information onto the external media card.

Abstract: A method of protecting media files includes dividing a media file into segments. Each segment is encrypted multiple times with a different encryption key each time. Downloads of the segments are controlled such that different combinations of segments and keys are downloaded. Key bundles are provided to user devices, with each key bundle is a combination of keys only for that user device combination of segments and keys.

Abstract: A service station wiper fluid in an inkjet ink printing system, which in addition to the servicing fluid, also has a surfactant which improves the surface energy consistency of the nozzle plate, thus stabilizing the drop directionality of the ink from inkjet nozzle to the print media.

Abstract: A device for printing stock standing on one edge, in particular a piece of mail in a postage meter and/or addressing machine, includes a guide plate for the stock which is inclined relative to the vertical and has a recessed region for a printing device. A rotating conveyor has a conveying plane which extends orthogonal to the guide plate and on which the stock stands on one edge and is transported in one direction while resting against the guide plate. The recessed region includes at least one cutout and a region of the guide plate downstream of the cutout is so far recessed from a bearing surface for the stock that there is no contact with the latter in this location. This ensures sufficient penetration time for the ink and prevents smearing of the printed image. The printing device is an ink jet printing device which is stationary during printing and which has a nozzle plane that extends parallel to the guide plate. The guide plate is inclined a maximum of 45.degree. from vertical.

Abstract: An ink-jet printer head is composed of stacked ink printer modules operating according to the edge-shooter principle and each equipped with plate-shaped piezoelectric actuators. The ink-jet printer head is for use in small, fast printers, suitable for use in a franking machine wherein a large number of nozzles are required. Plate-shaped spacer parts between the ink printer modules are structured such that they serve both for assuring the required spacing between neighboring modules as well as for setting an offset of the nozzle apertures of the neighboring ink printer modules relative to one another. To that end, the spacer parts are provided with registration elements at both sides that engage into allocated recesses of the ink printer modules. Each ink printer module also has electrical interconnects for connection to a driver circuit.

Abstract: A tractor unit for a recording sheet is provided. A tractor belt is provided with protrusions for engaging with feed holes formed on both sides of the recording sheet. A pulley rotates the tractor belt and a frame supports the pulley. The recording sheet is fed in a predetermined direction by rotation of the pulley. The frame has a top sensor for sensing passage of a leading edge of recording sheet and for outputting a predetermined signal. A cover member covers the recording sheet such that the recording sheet does not warp or float up from the tractor belt.

Abstract: Accumulated heat correcting data of an Nth line to be printed is subtracted from original heat data of the Nth line. This corrected heat data of the Nth line is supplied to a head driver which drives a thermal head to record dots of one line on a recording sheet. The corrected heat data of the Nth line is multiplied by a coefficient K1 to obtain first data. The first data is added to the accumulated heat correcting data of the Nth line, and sum data of the addition is written in a line memory as second data. In printing the (N+1)th line, the second data is read from the line memory. The second data is multiplied by a coefficient K2 to obtain the accumulated heat correcting data of the (N+1)th line, which is used for accumulated heat correction of the original heat data of the (N+1)th line.

Abstract: A wiping apparatus for a recording head of an ink jet recording apparatus, which has a recording head including an ink ejection portion, includes a wiping member, and a rotation device for rotating the recording head and/or the wiping member so that the wiping member slides on the ink ejection portion. The apparatus prevents the splash of ink caused when the wiping member leaves the ink ejection portion by using one of the following techniques: First, a wiping speed is decreased at the end of wiping; second, an angle between the wiping member and the ink ejection portion is declined as the wiping proceeds; third, the first and second techniques are combined; and fourth, an approach amount of the wiping member to the ink ejection portion is reduced at least just before the wiping member leaves the ink ejection portion.

Abstract: Tubeless printhead-priming cap and system for ink-jet printers are described. The system is preferably implemented, using the existing printer carriage drive motor, by the use of a printhead-sealing cap having a rolling diaphragm in a lower region thereof that defines a chamber within the priming cap, with the diaphragm being reciprocated, by a spring-returned lever having a piston on one end thereof, in synchronism with lateral and differential vertical movement of a cap-carrying sled. Priming is performed uni-directionally to avoid reverse priming of the printhead. The chamber may be emptied by reversing the operation of the priming cap to pump accumulated ink into a blotter by positioning the priming cap against an ink blotter provided in a rotatable member defining a multi-service station.

Abstract: An image processing apparatus includes a device for reducing a matrix size of each of plural tomographic original images of one section of an object to be examined, the images being picked up with change of time, a device for performing a moving average process with respect to the data changed with time of each of the pixels of the obtained reduced image, the device for approximating the data changed with time of each pixel after the moving average process is done with a function, and a device for extracting a feature amount of the approximated function and creating a functional image on the feature amount.

Abstract: An image recording apparatus comprises a temporary storing magazine for temporarily retaining a recorded photosensitive material sheet. The temporary storing magazine stocks the recorded photosensitive sheet received therein from an image recording section while discharging the recorded photosensitive material sheet into an automatic developing machine. Hence, image recording is executed without interruption and parallel to discharge of the recorded photosensitive material sheet into the developing machine, enhancing the capability of the image recording apparatus.

Abstract: A thermal ink-jet pen cartridge having a rigid external frame member fabricated of a rigid engineering plastic, and an interior frame structure attached thereto, formed of a softer, more ductile plastic material than an engineering plastic. An ink reservoir is defined by the interior structure and a pair of flexible bag membranes formed of a plastic material impervious to the ink and compatible with the interior member material, allowing the membranes to be joined to the interior member to form a leak-proof joint. The external structure has locking features formed into an interior surface. When the interior member is injection molded to the external member, the molten material flows into and around the locking features, securing the interior member to the external member and resisting the shrinkage forces as the molten material cools. The ink reservoir is filled through a fill port passageway extending through the external frame member and the inner member.

Abstract: The present invention changes a color corresponding to a source color to a destination color by initially selecting a target source color and a target destination color. The selected target source color is converted to a source hue value, a source chroma reference value, and a source lightness reference value, and the selected target destination color is converted to a destination hue value, a destination chroma reference value, and a destination lightness reference value. A circuit then generates a first set of source/destination chroma and a first set of source/destination lightness values representing source/destination chroma and lightness relationships, respectively, for sources values in a range from the source chroma and lightness reference values, respectively, to minimum source chroma and lightness values, respectively, using a first and third function, respectively.

Abstract: An elongate exhaust gas muffler for a turbine engine includes a foraminous central exhaust duct which is circumscribed along its length by a plurality of tuned dissipative and reactive noise attenuation chambers. At an inlet end of the muffler an annular secondary flow inlet is defined about the central exhaust duct and opens to the first sound attenuation chamber. A secondary flow of pressurized bleed air is receivable into the first attentuation treatment in the muffler.

Abstract: A thermal printer includes a ribbon supply device for running a transfer ribbon through a printing section. The device includes a ribbon unit and a ribbon drive section which are removably mounted on a head supporting frame of the printing section. The ribbon unit includes a supply shaft on which the ribbon is wound, a take-up shaft for take-up the ribbon drawn from the supply shaft, a tension shaft, and a ribbon drive shaft. The supply and tension shafts are arranged to be symmetrical to the take-up and ribbon drive shafts, respectively, about an imaginary plane which extends between the supply shaft and the take-up shaft and between the tension shaft and the ribbon drive shaft, in parallel with these shafts, so that the unit is capable of being remounted on the head supporting frame while the unit is turned through 180 degrees.

Abstract: A printing apparatus having an electrothermically operated printing head (10) in the form of a bubble jet ink printing head or of a thermotransfer printing head comprises a plurality of individual heating elements (11) drivable in pulsed fashion, whereby an inking agent is locally heated in character-dependent fashion via the heating elements (11) during the writing mode and is transferred onto a recording medium (12) on the basis of the triggering of an aggregate change of state. A sensor (S) that acquires the change of state of the inking agent medium at each and every heating element (11) and that can be printer-independent generates a sensor signal allocated to the point in time of the change of state. The operating frequency of the printer is controlled dependent on the sensor signal. The identification of the change of state of the inking agent corresponds to a temperature measurement of the heating measurements.

Abstract: A thermal head including a substrate, a plurality of thermal resistance elements formed on the substrate corresponding to print dots, a driving device for applying pulse voltage to the thermal resistance elements corresponding to print data, a temperature sensor provided on the substrate for sensing the temperature of the substrate, and an analog controller provided on the substrate and receiving an output from the temperature sensor for controlling the pulse voltage, so as to unify the print characteristic of the thermal resistance elements.

Abstract: An analog-to-digital converter comprises plural amplifiers, a first group of transistors for input, a second group of transistor for biasing, a third group of transistors for feedback and plural inverters. The first group of transistors are PMOS transistors, and the second and third groups of transistors are NMOS transistors. The connecting weight of each transistor may be set with the conductance values thereof in accordance with a geometrical aspect ratio W/L of MOS transistors. The amplifiers comprise two CMOS inverters connected in series.