What is TWAIN?
| What is TWAIN? |
| Technology Without An Interesting Name |
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TWAIN is a widely-used program that lets you scan an image (using a scanner) directly into the application (such as PhotoShop) where you want to work with the image. Without TWAIN, you would have to close an application that was open, open a special application to receive the image, and then move the image to the application where you wanted to work with it. the TWAIN driver runs between an application and the scanner hardware. TWAIN usually comes as part of the software package you get when you buy a scanner. It's also integrated into PhotoShop and similar image manipulation programs. A control interface that allows the scanner to be accessed from within another program (called the host application), for example graphics or DTP software. This means that instead of having to create the scanned image in a separate program, save it and then re-open it in the graphics application, the scanner delivers the image directly to the host application's window, thus saving time. This interface allows the image acquisition device (scanner) to be controlled so that the parameters of the image such as colour balance, size, tonal range etc can be specified before the image is acquired. The TWAIN driver is called a " TWAIN source" and if more than one driver is present in a system, there will be a means to select the correct source from the "file" menu of the host program. TWAIN limitations TWAIN relies on library (common) files and most applications will check for and install TWAIN libraries on first installation. However, some applications may install out of date library files which cause other TWAIN sources to fail. Furthermore, some implementations of TWAIN in host applications do not work well with other manufacturer's TWAIN sources. Furthermore, some functions were and are not available in Versions of TWAIN such as the possibility to rotate the image (v1.5) and the passing of colour space information (TWAIN 1.6 and later). |
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