Patent ID: 8228538

Claim:
A network device comprising: a user interface that is configured to receive user input; a user interface module that is configured to process the user input and that is developed in a platform-independent programming language; a job processing module that is developed in a platform-dependent programming language; and a print process that is configured to process particular print data and cause one or more electronic documents reflected in the particular print data to be printed on a tangible medium; wherein the network device is configured to perform the steps of: establishing an inter-process communication channel between the user interface module of the network device and the job processing module of the network device, wherein the user interface module is developed in the platform-independent programming language, wherein the job processing module is developed in the platform-dependent programming language; and receiving, at the network device via a network, a job that includes electronic data, wherein the network device includes one or more modules that are configured to generate a printed version of an electronic document reflected in the electronic data; while processing the job, sending one or more messages between the job processing module and the user interface module via the inter-process communication channel; wherein sending the one or more messages comprises: the user interface module calling a first function that causes the job processing module to establish a connection between the job processing module and the print process to be established; the user interface module calling a second function that causes the job processing module to write print data to a port of the print process; the user interface module calling a third function that causes the job processing module to close the connection.