A method is provided of digitally imaging a secure portion and a non-secure portion of scratch-off-coating protected documents of at least one game using middleware. The method includes: (a) generating the secure variable indicia in non-vector raster format; (b) generating vector graphics to be imaged on physical document locations; (c) assigning the secure variable indicia in a non-vector raster format to documents in and shuffling the documents throughout a print run; and (d) linking via middleware the secure variable indicia in the non-vector raster format to associated vector graphics variable indicia to be digitally imaged on the documents and to generate vector graphics-formatted data for each document in the print run. The secure variable indicia assignment and shuffling are executed by non-vector raster game generation software output that is reinterpreted by the middleware to produce related vector graphic output for the secure variable indicia.

System and methods for printing a multi-media document from an image file are provided. The method includes a printing device receiving a data holding image file. A processor of the printing device parses and extracts document data for printing the multi-media document from the data holding image file. The processor processes the document data to receive instruction data for one or more printing operation components of the printing device. The method also includes sending the instruction data to one or more printer operation components of the printing device. Also, the method includes each of the one or more printer operation components performing a printer operation onto a multi-media document.

A coding information extractor disclosed herein uses machine learning approach to extract coding information from documents. An implementation of the coding information extractor is implemented using various computer process instructions including scanning a document to generate a plurality of tokens, determining one or more features of the plurality of tokens using term frequency (TF), inverse document frequency (IDF), and code type similarity features, and determining field type, field name, and field value of the one or more of the tokens using named entity recognition (NER).

A non-transitory computer readable storage medium stores a set of program instructions for an information processing apparatus including a processor, a communication interface, and a memory. The set of program instructions, when executed by the processor, causes the information processing apparatus to perform: acquiring type information indicative of a printer type; acquiring first data having a first format; identifying particular information corresponding to the acquired type information based on a conversion correspondence table, the conversion correspondence table showing a correspondence between the type information and the particular information, the particular information identifying at least a structure of data after conversion or a character code type of the data after conversion; converting the first data into second data corresponding to the identified particular information, the second data having a second format to be inputted to the printer; and outputting the second data.

Embodiments disclosed include systems and methods for computer automated print services control comprising authenticating a user credential input via a user device. The system and method includes generating, by a printer driver comprised in the user device, a user interface comprising features supported by a plurality of printing devices. Further, it includes receiving via the user device over the network, a print instruction comprising the features supported by the plurality of printing devices connected to the computer system over the network. And based on the print instruction, generating a print job in an embodiment. Further, based on the user authentication at one of the plurality of printing devices, converting via a gateway, the received print instruction into a format compatible with that printing device and releasing the generated print job for printing at that printing device, according to an embodiment.

Methods and apparatus for encoding data streams are provided. A computing device can receive an encoder-input data stream (EIDS) encoded in a encoder-input format. The computing device can reformat the EIDS into an encoder-output data stream (EODS) encoded in an encoder-output format that differs from the encoder-input format. The EODS can include a page table for pages, resources of the pages that include reusable resources used multiple times, and binary-formatted commands related to the resources, which are stored in stored in first-come, first-served fashion. The page table can refer to pages of the EODS. The EODS can be based on a resource table storing entries for each reusable resource. Each reusable resource is stored only once in the EODS. The computing device can generate an output based on the EODS.

A coding information extractor disclosed herein uses machine learning approach to extract coding information from documents. An implementation of the coding information extractor is implemented using various computer process instructions including scanning a document to generate a plurality of tokens, determining one or more features of the plurality of tokens using term frequency (TF), inverse document frequency (IDF), and code type similarity features, and determining field type, field name, and field value of the one or more of the tokens using named entity recognition (NER).

A method is provided of digitally imaging a secure portion and a non-secure portion of scratch-off-coating protected documents of at least one game using middleware. The method includes: (a) generating the secure variable indicia in non-vector raster format; (b) generating vector graphics to be imaged on physical document locations; (c) assigning the secure variable indicia in a non-vector raster format to documents in and shuffling the documents throughout a print run; and (d) linking via middleware the secure variable indicia in the non-vector raster format to associated vector graphics variable indicia to be digitally imaged on the documents and to generate vector graphics-formatted data for each document in the print run. The secure variable indicia assignment and shuffling are executed by non-vector raster game generation software output that is reinterpreted by the middleware to produce related vector graphic output for the secure variable indicia.

A printing computing device connects to a printing device using a fast data transfer connector to enable additional functionality and capabilities not offered by the printing device. The printing computing device connects to a network to receive print jobs from external devices within the network. The printing computing device processes the print jobs according to rules such that print jobs are processed accordingly. The printing computing device also includes firmware not available on the printing device such that print jobs not supported by the printing device still may be processed. The printing computing device also includes an engine that determines whether an incoming print job is a PDL print job or a command to perform a function not available on the printing device.

An apparatus and a method are provided in which a virtual printer service of a host computer automatically acquires from a real printer a response in response to a device search request without receiving the virtual printer generation instruction from a user, and a virtual printer configured to transmit a print job to the printer is then generated for each printer that responded to the device search request.