Patent ID: 7992773

Claim:
A method comprising: detecting symbology associated with an object; decoding the symbology to obtain a decode string; sending the decode string to one or more visual detection applications for processing, the one or more visual detection applications residing on a portable electronic device; receiving a first amount of information about the object from the one or more visual detection applications; sending the decode string to a remote server for processing; receiving a second amount of information about the object from the remote server; combining the first amount of information with the second amount of information to obtain cumulative information; and displaying the cumulative information on a display device associated with the portable electronic device; wherein one or more visual detection systems are configured to run in the background with respect to other systems associated with the portable electronic device, the visual detection systems comprising the one or more visual detection applications and one or more visual detection devices, the one or more visual detection devices configured to detect the symbology associated with the object.