Patent ID: 7688794
Filing Date: 2010-03-30
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A printing system comprising: a plurality of printing devices, each printing device of the plurality of printing devices comprising an associated radio frequency identification (RFID) device, the RFID device associated with a first printing device of the plurality of printing devices operable to sense the presence of an RFID device associated with a second printing device of the plurality of printing devices such that the first printing devices senses the presence of the second printing device; wherein the RFID device associated with the second printing device includes an RFID tag storing a unique RFID identifier which is associated with the second printing device; wherein the RFID device associated with the first printing device includes an RFID reader device for sensing the RFID tag associated with the second printing device when the RFID tag associated with the second printing device is located within a predetermined operating range of the RFID reader device associated with the first printing device and for retrieving the RFID identifier stored by the RFID tag associated with the second printing device; wherein each printing device further comprises: at least one cluster, each cluster of the at least one cluster including at least one printing device of the plurality of printing devices, wherein the processor of the first printing device executes the application software to divert the received printing job request to the second printing device subsequent to configuration of a cluster including the first and second printing devices; wherein each cluster has a cluster name, each printing device of the plurality of printing devices further comprising a storage device accessible by the processor for storing the cluster name of the cluster in which the respective printing device is included; wherein responsive to the RFID reader device of the first printing device sensing the RFID tag of the second printing device and retrieving the RFID identifier stored by the sensed RFID tag, the processor of the first printing device executes the application software for configuring the cluster including the first and second printing devices according to a clustering process comprising: requesting via the network the cluster name stored by the storage device of the printing device of the plurality of printing devices that has an associated RFID identifier that substantially matches the retrieved RFID identifier; comparing the cluster name stored by the storage device of the first printing device with the cluster name received via the requesting; and selecting a cluster name from the compared cluster names to be the cluster name of the cluster; and wherein the storage device of each of the first and second printing devices stores the selected cluster name as the cluster name of the cluster configured to include the first and second printing devices.