Privately-held Document Technologies Inc of Palo Alto, California is another young US company hopeful that document image processing will grow into a major new business area, and has come out with a new line of host-controlled image processing subsystems that are designed to integrate seamlessly with conventional mainframe, minicomputer and network-based data processing systems – very similar to the products picked up by IBM from Image Business Systems Inc for the RT (CI No 1,187). Called ImageServer, Document Technologies’ new family is designed to provide complete support for the rapid and simple integration of document and data processing. Key to the product line is the company’s proprietary distributed image database architecture, all document image processing tasks are off-loaded from a host onto attached Document Technologies ImageServer subsystems, freeing the host computer to contol the system application without having to perform any image processing tasks itself – and the ImageServer subsystem appears as a standard terminal to the host, requiring only simple protocol extensions to support the image processing tasks. The system supports document display, printing, scanning, communicating and manipulating pixel maps of document images. The company says it has developed a high performance, multi-function image processor, which is at the heart of every ImageServer, using multiple parallel co-processors to provide unprecedented levels of performance in document image processing applications – but unfortunately fails to say what processors it is using. Each ImageServer includes two programmable serial channels and an IEEE 802.3 Ethernet co processor. Image scanners, image printers and other peripherals can be connected directly to an ImageServer via high-speed video interfaces, so that they can operate at their maximum rated speeds – up to 60 image pages per minute. A fast hardware compression-expansion co-processor supports standard CCITT image compression for optimal speed and compatibility. Storage options include high-speed magnetic and exchangeable optical write-once disks. An Image Terminal connects directly to each ImageServer, displaying document images at true 200 or 400 dots per inch resolution on a full 8.5 by 11 portrait screen. The Image Terminal can display interactive terminal session data via widely-used window managers, enabling ImageServers to emulate a variety of standard terminals in existing application environments, and applications for standard ANSI or X terminals can be augmented with image function with little or no modification to existing code. Distributed image database For people wanting to distribute the things, multiple ImageServers are interconnected over a back-bone Ethernet to support access to image peripherals and libraries via the distributed image database architecture. Latest additions to the line are the ImageServer 200 200dpi image server subsystem; ANSI/ImageServer applications, which supports emulation of a standard ANSI interactive terminal, and the X/ImageServer, which emulates a Unix-hosted X terminal. Volume OEM price for a complete ImageServer subsystem starts at less than $5,000, depending on storage options and configuration, and is out now. The ANSI/ImageServer and the X/ImageServer firmware applications are each priced at $250.
