Shapeless -- A New Language Concept and Related Technology

A method to mark packages, and surfaces, with markings that are properly readable under conditions where geometry-specific markings are not very readable, as on a surface of a waving flag, a surface of a wrinkled package, or of a curved shape, or partly soiled, by using an alphabet that is not based on geometry-specific shapes of its letters, rather a “shapeless alphabet”, defined through “shapeless letters” comprising:

• painting a surface with a sequence of shapeless letters L1, L2, . . . , Lt where each shapeless letter corresponds to a painted area:
• M1, M2, . . . , Mt
• where each painted area M is a mixture of two distinct colors A and B, such that Qm=Qa+Qb, where Qm is the area of M, and Qa and Qb are the areas of colors A and B respectively, and where the quantitative ratio between the colors comprising the painted area is computed as Rm=Qa/Qb,
• and where the uniformity of M is measured relative to slices S1, S2, . . . Sn marked randomly on the painted surface, M, such that their areas are all the same, Qs, where Qs<Qm, and where the uniformity of the quantitative ratios between colors A and B in the n slices, Ri=Qai/Qbi, for i=1,2, . . . n, for an arbitrary large n, expresses the uniformity, U, of the mixture M, and where the values of R and U in combination determine the identity of the shapeless letter L, expressed by area M:
• L=f(U,R).

A system to mix two viscous incompressible chemical ingredients A and B to create a mixture, lump, M, where M expresses a shapeless letter L from a given shapeless alphabet, comprising:

• an “entropic mixer”, EM, that mixes ingredients A and B into a mixture stream M, which in turn is read by an “entropic reader” ER to determine the shapeless letter L written into M,
• an entropic controller, EC, which compares the reading of the shapeless letter, L, to a set point letter, Lsp given to it, and then the EC adjusts operational parameters in the EM in order to generate M with the desired set point letter Lsp, the adjusted mixture stream M is again read by the ER that evaluates its shapeless letter L′, and communicates the shapeless letter L′ to the EC, which again adjusts the operational parameters of EM until Lsp=Lm, where Lm is the shapeless letter expressed by M when the feedback control sequence is completed,
• wherein the identity of the shapeless letter L expressed by the lump M is determined as follows:
• the lump M is a mixture of two ingredients A and B such that the ratio, R, between the volume of A, Va, and the volume of b, Vb, in M is a ratio corresponding to L, and such that the uniformity of M, U, is of the value corresponding to L, where U is defined as follows:
• (i) one randomly marks n slices on M where all the slices are of volume Vs<Vm, where Vm is the volume of M, then
• (ii) one measures the n ratios between ingredients A and B in each of the n slices, and uses a certain established uniformity calculating formula to compute the uniformity U of M, from the n ratio values, for a pre-established value of n;
• so manufactured the shapeless letter expressed by the lump will be readable from any surface of the lump, and from any cut thereto, and thereby identify it.

A machine readable medium having painted surface M to express a shapeless letter L, of a given shapeless alphabet, comprising:

• a combination of smooth areas, A, and unsmooth areas B, where the ratio between the surface size of all the smooth areas in M, Pa, and the surface size of all the unsmooth areas in M, Pb, is the ratio value R=Pa/Pb, corresponding to L, and
• wherein the uniformity between the smooth and the unsmooth areas is the value U corresponding to L, where U is defined as follows:
• (i) one randomly marks n sectors on M where all the sectors are of area Ps<Pm, where Pm is the area of M, then
• (ii) one measures the n ratios between the sum of areas of A and the sum of areas of B in each of the n sectors, and uses a certain established uniformity calculating formula to compute the uniformity U of M, from the n ratio values, for a pre-established value of n;
• so manufactured the surface M will express an intrinsic shapeless letter to identify it to its readers.