Method and apparatus to process drawing images
US5946415A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Oct 24, 1996 |
| Grant date | Aug 31, 1999 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Oct 24, 2016 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06V30/422
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
The processing time and memory in converting scanned images to a hardware scription language is significantly reducer by using a "peephole" method to examine only partial images of features of the scanned image that is to be converted. The present method generated minimized feature templates (MFTs) by systematically removing all non-feature image pixels. In particular, the method and apparatus of the present invention establishes pattern estimates from image samples, eliminates unnecessary image pixels using off-line statistical analysis, and extracts feature templates from the larger size image patterns. Pattern recognition is then conducted by processing a few pixels of the unknown image pattern. An application of this technique is to recognize drawing symbols, such as, AND, NAND, OR, NOR, XOR, and XNOR gates, buffers, inverters, registers, and I/O pins from scanned images of electronic drawings.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.