Xpaper to the Rescue

In the last week, I have several different opportunities to use Xpaper which really helped me out in a pinch. In the first instance, I was completing a credit check application to a computer distributor so that I could resell Okidata printers as part of digital pen and paper solution. The company dutifully sent me a link to their Credit Application which I completed online. When the form was completed, I was able to save it as a PDF- now my challenge was that the Credit Application had to be signed by me in several places. With Xpaper that was an easy task! I simply printed the Credit Application Form using the Xpaper driver to my OkiData printer and signed the Credit Application Form with my Logitech Digital pen. When I docked my pen I had a crystal clear PDF with my signature ready to email back to the computer company. Using the built-in workflow my signed PDF was automatically uploaded and stored to GoggleDocs. How is that for automation? There are a host of different work-flow routing (SharePoint) and connectors (ftp, email) that make storing your documents easy to accomplish. All of this took seconds to accomplish with Xpaper. Back in the day I would have had to scan the entire document and it would have never looked as good as the output from Xpaper. Find out how your business or company can use Xpaper to automate your paper work flow and make the paper work for you! To arrange a free demo click here to register and I will be in touch with you.

William Paterson University Accessbility Conference 2011

William Paterson University and Bergen County Special Services School District will be hosting the Accessibility Conference 2011: Reaching & Teaching All Learners Through Technology, which will be held on January 13, 2011 in Wayne , NJ. This looks to be one of the premiere assistive technology conferences to be
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offered this year in New Jersey and I hope you can come out and spend the day with us. Dave Marra, from Apple Computer will be the keynote and share with us all of the excitement Apple has generated with their lineup of exciting products that have touched the lives of students we work with. Throughout the day there will be ongoing presentations and workshops which I'm sure you will find relevant and important in the work that you do.

During the day I will be presenting on Innovative Uses for Digital Pen Technology.  So if you want to learn about the Livescribe Smartpen, or PaperShow for Teachers, or Xpaper then stop on by find out how these innovative solutions can be used in the classroom. Find out how these innovative digital pen and paper solutions can change the way you teach and offer you a range of outstanding benefits.

xPaper - Great Digital Pen Solution

I have been a long time user of digital pen technologies and am always amazed by its feature set and simplicity. At the core of digital pen technologies is Anoto functionality which gives software developers the tools to create innovative solutions. For the past several years I have been using a solution from Talario called xPaper. In it latest iteration xPaper, lets you print your forms on ordinary paper and write on the form with the digital pen. Once the pen is docked the ink is automatically downloaded to the form and within seconds you have a crystal clear PDF of your contents that you are ready to add to your work flow.

xPaper is comprised of several different components; the xPaper software, the xPaper printer driver, and a commercially licensed digital pen. Once you load the xPaper software and XPaper printer driver you are ready to get started. You simply open any form on your computer and using the xPaper printer driver you print the form on your color printer. Talario has a list of suggested and approved printers that can be used with their solution on their web site. Once the form is printed you will notice a light watermark dot pattern on your print out. These dots allow the digital pen, which has a camera at the base to know exactly where the ink is being written. It is quite ingenious to say the least. Now all you have to do is write on the paper and dock the pen to see the results. Within seconds the ink appears on the form and you are ready to add it to your work flow. Talario has a number of Connectors that let you decide what you would like to do with the form that is stored in the xPaper application. Using one of the connectors you could easily send the PDF to your Gmail account or FTP it to your server. In any case with a couple of clicks of the mouse you can transpose your form into a digital document and archive it.

This past semester I was teaching a graduate course in Action Research and utilized xPaper to record my biweekly meetings with my students as I mentored them through the process. To get started, I printed my Conference Log Sheet with xPaper and once the students met with me I would record our session notes with the digital pen along with my expectations for our next meeting. When my student's left our meeting I would hand them the form as a review of the session for them as a take away and then I would dock my pen so that I had a record of the meeting. xPaper worked flawlessly and many of my students remarked at the end of the semester that having the progress notes really helped them to move through the process. Using xPaper saved me a great deal of time, energy, and paper. Having my students' archived notes on my computer that I could quickly access worked out extremely well for me as well. Now that we are in the process of accreditation it is great that I can archive this information.

If you are looking for ways to add digital pen and paper solutions to your work flow send me an email and I can share with you how you can use Xpaper in the work that you do to increase efficiency. xPaper is ideal for anyone who uses forms on a daily basis and needs a way to move them to the computer for backup and archival purposes.