In some embodiments, systems, apparatuses and methods are described herein useful to indicate the number of products on a merchandising unit. Counting devices as described herein maintain an accurate count of the number of products on a given merchandising unit and provides a display of the count.

A coin processing machine includes a coin support plate having a coin support surface defining a coin path extending from an intake location to a coin removal station. Depressions formed in the coin path reduce the likelihood of coins, particularly wet coins, from adhering to and stopping along the coin path.

A coin processing machine includes a coin support plate having a coin support surface defining a coin path extending from an intake location to a coin removal station. Depressions formed in the coin path reduce the likelihood of coins, particularly wet coins, from adhering to and stopping along the coin path.

A vending machine for selling or dispensing products or items to a user may include a container for storing and displaying the products. The container may have a transparent portion making the products visible from outside the container, and an aperture for removing one or more products by hand, wherein the aperture gives direct access to the products. An aperture access enabling device may selectively enable or prevent access through the aperture into the container. Finally, a recognition module for recognizing each of the products in the container, may include at least one module selected from the group consisting of: a camera based object recognition module, a weight recognition module, and an RFID recognition module. Also described are methods of operating the vending machine.

A distributed smart locker system includes a plurality of locker units in a locker cluster. Each locker unit includes: a front panel with a set of inputs for an end user to retrieve an at least one item stored in the locker unit; a back panel with a set of outputs for an operator to place the at least one item in the locker unit; and a computing device with a processor, memory, storage, and wireless networking capability.

Computationally implemented methods and systems include acquiring user information associated with one or more users for use in generating one or more customized food items that are customized specifically for the one or more users, the user information to be acquired including at least one or more user preferences related to integrity of one or more food ingredients to be included in the one or more customized food items; and directing generation of the one or more customized food items for the one or more users, the one or more customized food items having been customized to show one or more visual indicators that provide customized information that has been customized in accordance, at least in part, with the acquired user information. In addition to the foregoing, other aspects are described in the claims, drawings, and text.

The present disclosure is directed to systems and methods for generating investigations of user behavior. In an example embodiment, the system includes a video camera configured to capture video of user activity, a video analytic module to perform real-time video processing of the captured video to generate non-video data from video, and a computer configured to receive the video and the non-video data from the video camera. The computer includes a video analytics module configured to analyze one of video and non-video data to identify occurrences of particular user behavior, and an investigation generation module configured to generate an investigation containing at least one video sequence of the particular user behavior. In some embodiments, the investigation is generated in near real time. The particular user behavior may be defined as an action, an inaction, a movement, a plurality of event occurrences, a temporal event and/or an externally-generated event.

A system for dispensing one or more products can include one or more product containers, each with a port for dispensing a product, a housing with one or more container cavities for removably receiving the product containers, one or more quantity sensors for detecting a quantity of product within one or more product containers, one or more actuators for dispensing product from one or more product containers, and a controller configured to monitor or control one or more aspects of the system.

A drug supply device includes a hopper that collects solid drugs discharged from tablet cases on the basis of predetermined prescription data, an inspection device that inspects the solid drugs introduced from the hopper, and a packaging device that fills and packages the inspected solid drugs into a packaging sheet. The inspection device includes inspection containers that each hold a single administration dosage of the solid drugs, a movement mechanism that moves the inspection containers, and an imaging device that captures an image of the solid drugs in the inspection containers. As a result of capturing the image of the solid drugs in the inspection container by the imaging device, when a number of the solid drugs is different from the prescription data, the solid drugs are disposed of.

Example embodiments of the present invention may provide an efficient method of replenishing canisters of an automated dispensing device off-line. In particular, methods may include automatically causing an image to be captured at each of two or more stages of a replenishment process, where respective images are of a loading receptacle of a replenishment station, the loading receptacle configured to hold medication. The method may also include providing for display of respective images on a device located remote from the replenishment station, and receiving an approval or rejection of at least one stage of the replenishment process in response to providing for the display of respective images.