Web-based Integration of Printed and Digital Information

The affordances of paper have ensured its retention as a key information medium, in spite of dramatic increases in the use of digital technologies for information storage, processing and delivery. Recent developments in paper, printing and wand technologies may lead to the widespread use of digitally augmented paper in the near future, thereby enabling the paper and digital worlds to be linked together. We are interested in using these technologies to achieve a true integration of printed and digital information sources such that users may browse freely back and forth between paper and digital resources. We present web-based server technologies that support this integration by allowing users to dynamically link areas of printed documents to objects of an application database. The server component is implemented using the eXtensible Information Management Architecture (XIMA) and is independent of the particular paper, printing and reader technologies used to realise the digitally augmented paper. The framework presented manages semantic information about application objects, documents, users, links and client devices and it supports universal client access.