Patent ID: 6753974
Filing Date: 2004-06-22
Classification: G06K,G06T

Abstract:
A machine-based method comprisingreceiving compressed sets of pixel data defining parts of rasterized swaths of scan lines of an image of a page, where at least one of the parts of one of the rasterized swaths of scan lines of the image of the page overlaps another part of that swath of the image of the page, and the pixel data that defines the overlapping part includes mask data that identifies pixels of the overlapping part that are to be included in the image, decompressing the sets of pixel data, the decompressed data being used to generate a series of the rasterized swaths of scan lines of the image of the page including the pixels identified by the mask data, while each of the rasterized swaths of scan lines of the image of the page is being used by an output device, generating another of the series of rasterized swaths of scan lines of the image of the page, and using a page description in the form of two levels of linked lists to determine which of the parts to use and in what order to generate the rasterized swaths of scan lines, where an upper level one of the linked lists comprises a list of objects that form the image, the objects being sorted in top-to-bottom order by swaths of scan lines, and, within each swath, in order of overlap from back to front.