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Portable electronic printing device P-406394

[Category : - Computers and computer accessories - Ordering and selling methods]
[Viewed 1474 times]

The Invention is related to a portable electronic printing device. The device can be used in many areas, ranging from widespread private use and ending with retail sales, including gastronomy and hotel industry, and specialised use related to the obligation to print receipts of transactions made, for example, sales of transport tickets or parking tickets.

Electronic devices that have the ability to print are known in the art. As elements of sale system, they are constructed based on cash desks, which are specialised computers of PC (personal computer) class, constituting a central unit, connected with electric wires to other peripheral devices (LCD monitor, optionally equipped with a touch display, barcode reader, cash register keyboard, payment terminal and others), including receipt printer. In such solutions, computerised system integration is usually based on cable network. Conceptually, this solution is stuck in the early 90s of the last century, and is often outdated in technological terms. At the same time, it is obvious that this configuration is not suitable for portable applications due to the post complexity and multitude of equipment.
In the last few years, however, a very rapid development of mobile devices, mainly tablets and smartphones, has been observed. Development of new technologies is driven by the needs of the consumer electronics market, in particular by:
• desire to maximise the ergonomics of use - hence the commonly used touch displays, also in smartphones,
• need to transfer, process and store multimedia files, including video files of increasingly better qualities, which results in increasingly better LCD/OLED displays and in increasing higher computational power,
• desire to provide the customer with increasing better and easier access to resources and services contained in the virtual space (Internet, social networking sites, network services, shops, etc.),
The following experiences and solutions are particularly noteworthy:
• perfectly designed graphical user interfaces based on LCD/OLED touch display, allowing easy handling of the device both at the system and application levels; interfaces of various devices are quite similar, and significant majority of the population of users is already accustomed to these standards,
• processors and systems for supporting graphics (sometimes in a single chip) having high computational power and being very energy efficient,
• operating systems integrated with a standardised graphical user interface, using the touch display function, built specifically for mobile devices, which implies the effective use of computational power (e.g. smooth switching between tasks), as well as significant development of network access techniques or of "virtual space" (present in "old, classic" systems typical of large machines, and quite neglected in machines of PC type).
These possibilities are gradually being perceived and implemented by the market, thus allowing implementation of selected functionalities of sale system. For example, applications for typical mobile devices, which communicate with the printer (e.g. fiscal printer) via Bluetooth interface, or applications that allow, in some form, implementation of transactions by means of payment cards, are created. The drawback of such solutions is usually quite random (not rarely) hardware and software configuration of such a solution (e.g. insecure operating system and/or unreliable interface of peripheral device).
On the market, more modern devices are also available, which have computational capabilities assigned to standard computers, most of them being equipped with a touch display, which contain in a single housing, in addition to the processing system (central unit), also other functional modules, e.g. printing module, which are characterised by significant dimensions.

Therefore, it is an object of the invention to develop such a solution which would be a portable, compact and wireless device which could be used as a handheld device, without size restrictions, and which would combine above-described modern technologies, including the touch display, and have the ability to print. At the same time, the device would be devoid of all the above-mentioned disadvantages found in existing devices.
This device would be fully adapted to carry out the sales of goods and services, and the implementation of additional services and functionalities related to the integration with a local area network and virtual space.

A portable electronic printing device equipped with a microprocessor, comprsing a data processing module and a touch display designed for the user to communicate with the device and a printer module electronically connected and integrated in a single housing with the touch display, equipped with a paper tray and an opening for paper output from the printer, according to the invention is characterised in that the opening designed for paper output from the printer extends in parallel to the edge of the touch display and is a located at a distance of not more than 80 mm from this edge, more preferably not more than 5mm from this edge, and most preferably it is adjacent to this edge, wherein the housing of the said device has a back plane located opposite the touch display, the said plane being parallel to the surface of the touch display at least in the part comprising the housing of the data processing module.
Preferably, the printer module is equipped with a thermal printing mechanism.
Preferably, the printer module is equipped with a paper tray, preferably with a paper tray on a roll.
Preferably, the connection between the housing of the data processing module and the printer module is releasable, and the printer module is equipped with its own controller.
Preferably, the printer module is permanently integrated with the housing of the data processing module.
In this case, preferably, the printer module is equipped with its own controller which is connected to the data processing module via an interface, preferably including USB or RS232 connector.
In case the printer module is permanently integrated with the housing of the data processing module or is equipped with its own controller connected to the data processing module via an interface, especially including USB or RS232 connector, then, preferably the printer module is controlled by a microprocessor of the device.
Preferably, the device according to the invention is equipped with an additional display, more preferably arranged on a side wall of the printer module.
Preferably, the data processing module is equipped with RAM memory and FLASH memory.
In this case, preferably, the FLASH memory is implemented based on at least one of the following elements: blocks mounted on the motherboard of the data processing system module, SD cards, SSDs.
Preferably, the data processing module includes a graphics support system.
In this case, preferably the microprocessor and the graphics support system constitute an integrated circuit in the form of a single SoC block.
Preferably, the device according to the invention is equipped with at least one element allowing reading of bar codes, especially with a camera or a scanner.
Preferably, the device according to the invention is equipped with an RFID proximity reader.
Preferably, the data processing module is equipped with at least one network interface.
In this case, preferably, the network interface is selected from the group consisting of: Ethernet cable connection, WLAN module, Bluetooth module, mobile network interface, most preferably 3G/LTE.
Preferably, the data processing module has a multitasking operating system running in real time.
In this case, the operating system is equipped with a graphical user interface.
Preferably, the standard of easy paper loading system is used in the printer module.
Preferably, the device according to the invention is equipped with an internal power source of battery or storage battery type.
Preferably, the data processing module is a tablet or a smartphone.
Preferably, the data processing module has a touch display with a diagonal of 9 to 18 cm, more preferably of 10 to 15 cm.
The object of the present invention is also a use of this portable electronic printing device as part of the sales system.

Abstract

The invention is related to a portable electronic printing device equipped with a microprocessor, comprising a data processing module and a touch display designed for the user to communicate with the device and a printer module electronically connected and integrated in a single housing with the touch display equipped with a paper tray and an opening for paper output from the printer, characterised in that the opening designed for paper output from the printer (5) extends in parallel to the edge of the touch display (3) and is a located at a distance of not more than 80 mm from this edge, more preferably not more than 5mm from this edge, and most preferably it is adjacent to this edge, wherein the housing of the said device has a back plane located opposite the touch display (3), the said plane being parallel to the surface of the touch display (3) at least in the part comprising the housing of the data processing module (2).
The invention also relates to a use of the portable electronic printing device as part of the sales system.

Financial information

- patent to sell (already patented in US and POLAND, pending in EU and Canada)
- huge market potential all over the world Especially retail chains for self scanning device. Future of shopping systems.
- we already have almost finished device (payment terminal, PC module WIN10, barcode scanner, camera, thermal pinter).
- fully competitive with Poynt, Verifone, Ingenico...

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michal (Poland)

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