Embodiments of the system can relate to information tracking of items and/or other objects associated with the items. Some embodiments can include information tracking of the use of the items and/or objects. Some embodiments can include the use of markers associated with the items. At least one of the markers may be modifiable. In at least one embodiment, a marker can be configured to generate a certain detectable property (e.g., emit a signal, have a certain pattern, have a certain color, have a certain magnetic property, etc.). During use of the item and/or object associated with the item, the marker can be used to generate tracking information. Upon changing its detectable property, the marker can be caused to generate different and/or additional tracking information.

A barcode, comprising: a code region, comprising at least two different types of information which represents code information of the code region; and a boundary region, formed as a closed shape surrounding the code region; wherein a decoding direction of the code region is not relative to the boundary region. The present invention also provides a barcode processing system which can process the barcode to generate a control command, and provides a coffee machine using the barcode processing system. The barcode can be easily aligned by a closed boundary region, without using a frame buffer with a large size.

An apparatus and method for printing steganography is disclosed. The apparatus comprises a wearable unit and a controlling unit that are programmatically controlled by a processor. The controlling unit converts content to be published into a phoneme transcription for a target language, processes the content and further arranges the processed content as per a specified page layout. Further, the phoneme transcribed content is embedded into a QR code that is again extracted by a wearable unit to read the content, the content layout, and reading sequence. The wearable unit also converts the phoneme transcribed content into a voice output. Further, the wearable unit comprises motor sensors to sense a readers' body and neck movements to guide a reader to read content in a correct manner such that voice output is programmatically paused, stopped, repeated at intervals so determined.

An authentication tag and a method for producing the same are disclosed. For example, the authentication tag includes a substrate, a correlation mark printed on a first part of the substrate, a key printed on the second part of the substrate, wherein a portion of the substrate is transparent, and at least one raised feature is printed on the substrate.

Techniques for improving efficiency of an inventory system are described. In an example, operations of the inventory system may involve reading a marker attached with an item. The item may be available from an inventory space. Based on instructions of a computing management module of the inventory system, information about the item may be printed at a first location on a medium. Based on the instructions, a layer of disappearing ink may also be applied over at least a portion of the information. Further, based on the instructions, an identifier of the item may be printed at a second location on the medium. The medium, including the printed information, the layer of disappearing ink, and the printed identifier may form the marker.

Systems and methods to perform verification of physical control of a security device by a user are disclosed. In one aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure include a method for identifying a symbol in a first image frame of a microlens array of the security device and/or determining a position of the symbol relative to a predetermined point on a 2D plane of the security device. In a further embodiment, a rate of change of the position of the symbol between a second image and the first image frame of the microlens array can be determined. The physical control of the security device by the user is, for example, ascertained if the user is in close proximity to the security device of if the security device is within a line of sight of the user.

A secure document includes a fluorescent barcode and a fluorescent filler printed onto a substrate. The fluorescent barcode is printed using a first fluorescent ink of a first color and the fluorescent filler is printed using a second fluorescent ink of a second color that is different than the first color. In order to read the fluorescent barcode, the secure document must be illuminated with ultraviolet and/or infrared light. Then, a color filter must be used to filter the fluorescent filler out, leaving the fluorescent barcode visible.

Embodiments disclosed herein describe a multi-dimensional code storage and transfer system. The system gets electrical power from the flash light of a typical smart device, and displays a time-varying multi-dimensional code which can be captured and decoded by the smart device. The system can be made by printed electronics technology.

The present invention discloses a system and a method for decoding QR codes in complex scenes, a system and a method for generating multi-layer color QR codes and applications enabled by the systems and methods. The method for decoding a QR code may include detecting rough locations of the QR code by a learning-based QR code detector which is pre-trained off-line; localizing finder patterns and alignment patterns within each detected location; correcting geometric distortion of each QR code, based on the localized finder patterns and alignment patterns; restoring a color of each data module within each corrected QR code by a learning-based classifier; and decoding the QR code from each restored QR code. The application also discloses a system and a method to determine the optimal setting parameters for creating a multi-layer QR code to fulfill the user's requirements. Some applications enabled by these systems and methods are also disclosed.

A matrix barcode on a surface may comprise a plurality of colors, an infrared layer, and an ultraviolet layer. The matrix barcode may be a fiducial marker for conveying spatial information. The spatial information may stem at least in part from the infrared layer and the ultraviolet layer.