A portable writing apparatus includes a writing instrument carriage to hold a writing instrument and an actuator system coupled to the writing instrument carriage to move the writing instrument carriage. A controller is electrically coupled to the actuator system, and the controller includes logic that when executed by the controller causes the controller to perform operations including: receiving input data including a user's handwritten characters; and controlling the actuator system to move the writing instrument carriage in response to the input data. The writing instrument carriage traces a shape of the user's handwritten characters.

One embodiment provides a method including: detecting, at a touch surface, at least two points of contact of a hand of a user; identifying, based on a configuration of the at least two points of contact, an input provided by the user as handwriting input; and displaying, on a display screen, the handwriting input, wherein the handwriting input is identified as being input at a location relative to the at least two points of contact of the hand of the user. Other aspects are described and claimed.

In a method for a user to process a BOL (122) using an app on a cell phone (120) that includes a camera, a barcode on the BOL (122) is imaged with the camera and a data box is populated with information from the BOL (122). An indication is displayed to the user indicating what the app has determined to be the boundaries of the BOL (122). The user indicates when the BOL is within the boundaries and that the BOL (122) is within a predetermined range. An image of the BOL (122) is captured and the captured image of the BOL is displayed to the user. Upon receiving input from the user indicating that the captured image is acceptable, the captured image is analyzed so as to recognize text therein and captured text is assigned to data fields. The data fields are transmitted to a cloud-based server (10).

A writing system that includes a reusable notebook including a sheet having a working surface. The working surface includes a printed code including an operative control. The writing system includes a writing instrument configured to capture images of the printed code and a computing device configured to communicate with the reusable notebook and/or the writing instrument. The sheet includes a porous surface located in the working surface. A writing material of the writing instrument comprises solid particles having a particle size greater than a porosity of the porous surface.

A writing system that includes a reusable notebook including a sheet having a working surface. The working surface includes a printed code and an operative control. The writing system includes a writing instrument configured to capture images of the printed code and a computing device configured to communicate with the reusable notebook and/or the writing instrument. The sheet includes a surface coating over the working surface configured so that a writing material of the writing instrument can be removed by applying a dry ancillary device.

A writing instrument comprising a body having an axis, a writing tip, a reservoir and at least one visual mark being a specific mark for augmented reality applications, the at least one visual mark being configured to be hidden/visible when the writing tip is distant from a writing surface and to be respectively visible/hidden when the writing tip is in contact with a writing surface, at least a portion of the body being configured to allow the at least one visual mark to adopt two states, visible and hidden configuration.