Patent ID: 8262190

Claim:
A method for detecting and compensating for displacement of an optical imaging system from an expected position across a path for a media path in a printer comprising: identifying a printhead roll error for each printhead in a plurality of printheads in a printer; moving each printhead by an amount that corrects the printhead roll error for the corresponding printhead; generating a plurality of dashes on media with the plurality of printheads as the media moves past the plurality of printheads; identifying a position for each dash in the process direction from image data of the plurality of dashes on the media; identifying a displacement in the process direction for each optical detector in a linear array of optical detectors used to generated the image data of the plurality of dashes, the displacement being identified with reference to the identified positions for the dashes; and operating the printer to compensate for the identified displacements of the optical detectors.