Mitsubishi Electric MUX-25TV - E1 User Manual download pdf (Page 30)

NEWLINE is

simply

what it implies:

when the button on the

read head is

released

at

the

end

of the line a car-

riage

return is inserted

so

that the

next

character scanned

starts a

new

line. If the

reader

isn't

in the

NEW -

LINE mode

the characters

simply ap-

pend

to

the previously

scanned

characters.

The

NUMERIC mode pro-

grams

the Omni

-Reader to recognize

only

numeric

characters;

according

to the

manual this can speed up

numeric entry of

numbers.

As in

almost

everything

that's

digi-

tal there

must

be

some

way to clock

the signal so

that the computer

knows

what's

going

on.

In the conventional

big bucks

OCR device,

the photode-

tector or the

image

moves

at

a fixed

or clocked,

rate.

Hence, the corn

-

puter can be certain

of

what's taking

place.

On

the other

hand, the Omni

-

Reader's read

head is moved

manual-

ly,

and can

take from 0.5

to a couple

of seconds

to scan

the line. Unlike the

bar -code

reader in your local super-

market, in which the

normal toler-

ance

is relatively broad

because the

photodetector

works

within

a

small

limited area of thin and

thick bars,

manual scanning

of the Omni

-Read-

er

is too wide and too

variable;

so a

way is provided

to "clock" the

man-

ual scan.

The

clock

is a series of short and

long bars (actually

elongated dots)

imprinted

across

the

ruler

device

which

carries

the read

head. These

dots are also

illuminated along

with

the characters

by two small

lamps

built into the

read

head,

and the

photodetector merges the dots

into

the pattern seen by

the detector.

This

produces

what

is best described

as a

semi

-bar pattern consisting

of

the

elongated

dots integrated

with the

"bar"

pattern

of the characters.

Es-

sentially,

the

read head is "seeing" a

pattern

of individual bars.

With The

Keyboard

Software

provided

with

Omni

-Read-

er integrates

the device's

output

with

that

of the keyboard

for conven-

tional

programs such as

word proces-

Light- emitting diodes

across

the tablet's top indicate operating

models) and se-

lected character

font.

LEARN, NEWLINE,

NUMERIC,

and

TYPEFACEfunCtions are

determined

simply by

sweeping

the read

head

across

words

printed on

the tablet.

eliminate

the

resulting

bottleneck at

word

j, al,

such aei contrsatilk,44.

ceedings

and briefs, directly

to

ate

agencies

and

divisions

can

The

pointer

indicates

the

"clocking"

marks

printed

on the

bottom edge of

the

ruler that carries

the read head. These

marks

are

read

along

with the

characters

and provide

the

means by

which

the

internal microprocessor can recognize indi-

vidual characters

as the

read head

scans a printed

document.

sors,

spreadsheets,

etc.

In plain

English,

"integration"

means that

the Omni

-Reader's

output

is in paral-

lel

with

the

keyboard.

For example,

when word processing,

you can

type

a

line of text,

then scan any

number

of

lines or pages,

and then

resume

typing; as

far as the

word processor

is

concerned

all

input originated

from

the

keyboard.

It

Really Works

Although the Omni

- Reader does do

what its maker claims, as shown

in

accompanying

illustrations,

it

takes

considerable

practice and effort

to

develop a scanning

motion that

doesn't drop

characters or create

ty-

pographical errors.

Also, it

was

ex-

tremely difficult

to generate blank

lines

without generating "garbage."

(For

illustrations,

we

used

some

printed

text supplied

with the device.)

Figures 1

and

2 are early attempts

to scan the same

typewritten copy. In

Fig. 1, we had

lots

of problems

with

34

/

MODERN

ELECTRONICS / April /986

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