Electronic microcopier apparatus

A portable electronic copying apparatus that copies by manually sweeping it across the document to be copied and subsequently manually sweeping it across the material upon which the copy is made, said apparatus comprising:

• a light source to illuminate the material to be copied;
• a plurality of photosensors equally spaced in a row;
• an addressable electronic memory with a bit storage capacity substantially greater than the number of said photosensors;
• a plurality of printer elements equal in number to that of said plurality of photosensors, said printer elements being spaced equally in a row similar to that of said photosensors, said photosensor and printer rows being parallel to one another and substantially perpendicular to the direction of the sweep of said apparatus;
• position measuring means for measuring the position of said row of photosensors as that row is swept across the document to be copied and for measuring the position of said printer element row on the surface of the material on which the copy is to be made as said row is swept across said surface;
• addressing means to direct responses of said photosensors into said memory at addresses determined by said position measuring means;
• and,
• energizing means to energize said printer elements in response to signals stored in said memory at addresses determined by said position measuring means,
• wherein said position measuring means provides information concerning the position of said photosensors to said addressing means which information is subsequently used to direct the printing of said printer elements at the correct relative location with respect to said photosensors so that the information read by said photosensors is accurately duplicated by said printer elements.

A portable copying apparatus for reading documents and copying the information thereon onto other materials, said apparatus comprising:

• a light source;
• reading means for detecting optical information and producing an output related thereto;
• addressable electronic memory means connected to said reading means for storing said output from said reading means;
• writing means connected to said memory means for reproducing the information read by said reading means;
• position reckoning means for reckoning the position of said reading means over said document to be copied and for reckoning the position of said writing means over the material upon which the copy is subsequently to be made and for correlating the writings at any position over said material upon which the copy is made with respect to readings made at the same relative position on said document;
• and,
• optical means for directing light from said light source onto the material to be read and for transmitting said light from said material to be read to said reading means.

A portable copying apparatus for reading a document and subsequently making a copy of said document on other material, said apparatus comprising:

• light source means;
• reading means for detecting optical information and producing an output related thereto;
• electronic memory means connected to said reading means for storing said output from said reading means;
• writing means connected to said memory means for reproducing the information read by said reading means;
• position reckoning means for producing signals codifying positions of said reading means when said apparatus is moved across material to be copied and for codifying the positions of said writing means when said apparatus is subsequently swept across the material upon which the copy is to be made,
• wherein said light source means and said reading means are in substantially abutting relationship.

A portable, hand-holdable, self-contained copier apparatus contained in a manipulatable case comprising:

• reading means for detecting optical information on a document and producing an output related thereto;
• electronic storage means connected to said reading means for storing said output from said reading means;
• heater means connected to said storage means for reproducing on plain paper the information read by said reading means;
• position reckoning means for reckoning the position of said reading means over the document to be copied and of the position of said heating means over the plain paper on which the copy is to be made and for correlating the writings made by said heater means at any given position over said paper with the readings made by said reading means from said document at the same relative position on said document, so that said heating means accurately duplicates the information read by said reading means;
• roller means for applying a thermosensitive liquid on the surface of said plain paper just prior to writing thereon by said heater means;
• and,
• means for preventing said roller means from applying said liquid when said reading means is detecting optical information.

A hand-holdable, self-contained microcopier apparatus for copying documents by first manually sweeping said apparatus over said documents at an arbitrary first sweep rate and second, subsequently, manually sweeping said apparatus over a thermally sensitive paper at an independent second rate of sweep, said apparatus including:

• illumination means for illuminating said document;
• a number "n" of photosensors equally spaced in a row;
• an equal number "n" of heaters spaced identically to said photosensors in another parallel row;
• an electronic memory having "n" inputs and "n" outputs in parallel access panels, said memory being randomly addressable to "N" addresses, each storing "n" bits in parallel, said memory having a total storage capacity of "n" x "N" bits substantially greater than "n";
• position reckoning means for measuring the position of said apparatus over said document in its first sweep and the position of said apparatus over said paper in its second sweep and including means to generate a digital binary number which codifies said measured position;
• selecting means to select one address among the "N" addresses of said memory in accordance with said digital binary number;
• storage means to store in said memory the responses of said "n" photosensors at said selected addresses during said first sweep;
• and,
• energizing means to energize said "n" heaters in response to the stored "n" bits in said memory at said selected addresses during said second sweep.

A method for copying a document with a hand held apparatus, said apparatus including a row of "n" equally close-spaced photosensors, an equal number of "n" printer elements in a parallel identically spaced row, a random access memory with "n" parallel input and output channels and "N" addresses, position measuring means to measure the location of said apparatus when it is reading information from said photosensors and when it is printing the same information by means of said printer elements, said method comprising the steps of:

• manually sweeping said apparatus over said document at a first sweep rate;
• storing signals from said "n" photosensors in response to said sweeping in said "N" memory addresses as determined by said position measuring means;
• and,
• subsequently sweeping said apparatus over said document at a second sweep rate in such a fashion that said printer elements are selectively energized in accordance with said stored responses in said memory at memory addresses determined by said position measuring means,
• wherein said first sweep rate is independent of said second sweep rate.

A hand-holdable copying apparatus for copying documents by first scanning said apparatus over said document and by subsequently scanning said apparatus over the surface of the material upon which the copy is to be made, said apparatus including:

• reading means for sensing the optical information on said document and producing an output related thereto;
• an addressable memory for storing the output from said reading means;
• writing means controlled by said addressable memory for reproducing the information from said document on said material upon which the copy is to be made;
• odometer position reckoning means for measuring the position of said reading means when it is moved across said document and for measuring the position of said writing means when it is subsequently moved across the surface of the material upon which the copy is made and for generating digital signals codifying said measured positions;
• addressing means to address said addressable memory with said digital signals which codify the position of said apparatus so that the writing produced by said writing means at any location on the material upon which the copy is made is exactly a duplicate of the information read by said reading means at the same relative position on said document,
• wherein said reading means, memory means, writing means odometer means and addressing means are physically integrated in a hand-holdable unit.