
HP Labs developed a new rewritable printing technology - walterbell
https://newsblog.ext.hp.com/t5/HP-newsroom-blog/HP-Labs-developed-a-new-rewritable-printing-technology-set-to/ba-p/849
======
ChuckMcM
[I really want my browser back button back, argh!]

I wonder why people haven't done this before. The e-paper displays have always
been the 'epaper' layered over circuit that creates tightly controlled
electric fields. I'm guessing its something about the registration between the
'display' and the 'writer' that has fairly high tolerances. If they could
license the plastic logic process to make plastic versions of the e-paper then
you could have "paper" that you "print" but can recycle just by sticking it
back in the input paper tray. No money selling ink though :-)

------
ballenf
Really cool technology. Naturally, they are continuing the razor blade
business model:

> When a card is placed in this imager, a simple bar code on the back of the
> card uniquely identifies it to the HP IonTouch system, allowing the imaging
> device to retrieve whatever new information needs to be placed on the card.

(also seems a little backward that I wouldn't just send the info to the
printer and then put on/in the card I wanted to print/re-print.)

Maybe I'm reading too much into that, but I'd be surprised if it's totally
innocuous. But, then again the research and capital investment needed to make
this happen deserves to be rewarded, imo.

Hard to imagine how much they'll charge for a printer. Especially if it has no
toner to run out... and each card can be printed 10,000 times.

Each card costs "several tens of cent" \-- that struck me a marketing person
trying a little too hard to downplay the cost. But, the die sublimation
printers needed to print color on plastic badges are $10k+.

Side note, whatever happened to color e-ink displays?

~~~
luka-birsa
Color EInk displays built using a grayscale display and color filter are
already available, but sport lower contrast and a bit washed out colors. [ _1]

True color E Ink displays with multiple colors in each pixel were thought
physically impossible, but first prototypes were shown last year. I suspect
we're relatively close to a production version.

1_ I'm a cofounder of a company that develops and helps develop e paper
products and we sell color E Ink development kits.
[https://www.visionect.com](https://www.visionect.com)

~~~
bjelkeman-again
Could I use a Visionect Module to build an eInk laptop?

~~~
mattnewton
I never new I wasn't alone. I've had this fantasy since moving to sunny
California.

~~~
bjelkeman-again
I don't need anything fancy. If I could run Emacs in a shell I'd be satisfied.

------
userbinator
_“Since the only way to change information on the IonTouch cards is via our
IonTouch imagers, that also adds another layer of protection, making the cards
very secure, too._

If it's based on the same electrophoretic principle as regular EPDs, which
seems to be the case from reading their description, then they will be
affected by strong electric fields.

The concept itself is not particularly novel (this is just the electrophoretic
sheet inside an EPD, with the electrodes in a separate writing head), but I
think this may be the first time it's been productised for this particular
application:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyricon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyricon)

------
Animats
Whatever happened to Toshiba's erasable printer of 2012?[1] And Xerox's
reusable paper of 2006? [2]

[1] [http://www.tomsguide.com/us/printer-erasable-e-STUDIO-
RD30-M...](http://www.tomsguide.com/us/printer-erasable-e-STUDIO-RD30-Mult-
function,news-16403.html) [2] [http://www.treehugger.com/clean-
technology/xeroxs-reusable-p...](http://www.treehugger.com/clean-
technology/xeroxs-reusable-paper.html)

~~~
deno
This is really cool technology but printing out badges doesn’t seem like a
very compelling use case.

ePaper is cool _because_ it is dynamic. Without it it’s just really expensive
paper.

And I don’t think this can scale to replace paper recycling. Reuse like that
to be viable would have involve mechanical feeding for example. I’m guessing
this is also probably heavier and thicker. Never mind that, again, why
wouldn’t you just use an eInk reader instead.

Am I missing anything here?

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tyingq
Looks pretty neat...tiny 300dpi rewritable epaper display that needs no power
to retain the image. Sort of high tech etch-a-sketch.

I think they are overstating the security aspect though. You wouldn't​ need to
recreate the tech to mimic one of these. Actual paper behind clear plastic
would probably look similar if you experimented with paper color, print color,
some kind of bezel effect and the plastic overlay.

~~~
deno
> Looks pretty neat...tiny 300dpi rewritable epaper display that needs no
> power to retain the image.

You just described regular paper.

~~~
tyingq
You missed the rewritable part.

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alnitak
While the technology is impressive, I couldn't get over the fact that I _can
't_ leave this page using my back button without trying to outpace the
browser. Why do they even direct you somewhere else?

~~~
ams6110
Click-hold the back button, until the history list drops down, then move past
the half-dozen HP entries to get back to HN.

Trying to decide if this is deliberate or a bug where each page load does some
kind of reload(s) of itself.

~~~
alnitak
I visited the website on mobile. Not much I could do as Chrome doesn't provide
a software back functionality besides the system back button.

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walterbell
The printer seems to be a cloud-managed device tied to business customer
identity (note the password/code auth):

 _> They also added networking and cloud integration to the system, enabling
the Linux-based IonTouch imager to link with customer-owned cloud databases. A
retailer, for example, may recognize a customer’s gift card as it runs through
the imager, immediately debit it for a purchase, and then print the new
balance on the card along with a discount for a product relevant to the
customer’s previous buying habits.

... imagers that are both extremely reliable and yet are “hot swappable”. “If
you have any problem with an imager, our cloud backup system ensures a fast
replacement. Just swap in your spare imager, authorize it with your password
or code, and off you go,” Gila explains_

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amelius
Nice idea, but I don't see huge market potential yet. A simple label-printer
(where the labels are easily detachable) would offer almost the same
experience.

Also, if used for security badges, how will this prevent others from rewriting
them using a separate printer?

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heisenbit
Considering that I see e-ink displays in the supermarket I wonder whether this
is too late to find widespread uses outsides of niches.

~~~
softgrow
The supermarket is going to stick with their electronic shelf labels as they
are wireless updating, so no need for pulling them off the shelf to run
through a printer.

There will be other niches though, one mentioned is public transport
e-money/fare cards having the fare updated and promotional advertising. I
can't see that happening though as this would be too slow to move through a
gate compared to a NFC card. From a transport operators point of view they are
unlikely to want move back towards a system where the fare gate ingests,
prints and ejects a card. Have you seen the inside of a fare gate for dealing
with magnetic cards? More mechanical parts than your average pinball machine,
a wonder of technology but really nowhere near as reliable as an NFC reader
(picture at [http://www.industrytap.com/japan-railways-automated-
ticket-g...](http://www.industrytap.com/japan-railways-automated-ticket-gates-
named-ieee-milestone/10930) and illustrative video at
[https://youtu.be/MIzekUVPdgY](https://youtu.be/MIzekUVPdgY)). And of course
NFC is getting more availability on mobile phones so the fare card will
disappear into the mobile.

And of course, there is paper, mighty cheap and comes in fancy colours :)

Edited - add ticket gate image and video

------
apapli
Really great to see something that appears to be a genuine leap in progress,
and shows that HP has been able to continue innovating.

------
bingobob
seems like its similar to NFC-WISP from Alanson Sample
[http://www.alansonsample.com/research/NFC-
WISP.html](http://www.alansonsample.com/research/NFC-WISP.html)

------
6stringmerc
Give me four weeks, $5,000, and I'll find at least one viable exploit.
Considering the audience here, I don't think this kind of joke is really too
far fetched. "Every solution breeds new problems" as one of the Murphy's Law
axioms goes.

Not saying this channel is a bad idea! I'm just the kind of guy who likes
breaking things to see how they work. Criminals are almost always one step
ahead because they see things in ways others might not imagine. Those errant
use-cases are the ones to try to bulwark against...better when for fun than
when the stakes are really high, know what I mean?

~~~
tyingq
They don't seem any worse than typical badges used today. It's just replacing
printed info and lamination, which is just as hackable. That's how I would
hack this...print something that resembles the epaper display with suitable
clearish plastic over it and something for a slight bezel effect.

These would still need whatever separate RFID or NFR tech is used to swipe and
open gates, doors, etc.

Edit: Here's a higher res version of the product image:
[https://wuqqf55242.i.lithium.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-i...](https://wuqqf55242.i.lithium.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-
id/636i34B020A44A85635B)

~~~
6stringmerc
Fair points! I don't disagree, and also think what we can find in common is
that effort is usually a precursor to execution. As in, it's not easy to make
laminated / official looking ID type things. The whole "Fake IDs" thing that
is always a reasonable market - they don't have to be great, they just have to
be good enough, right?

So that's the flip side, an escalation in confidence factor - oh this is new
and it's not as exploitable! - is perfectly reasonable at first. I'm not
trying to be sarcastic about this, but I remember reading that some crew found
an exploit in pacemaker protocols (e.g. connectivity) that could be
manipulated if a person had bad intentions. Who sits around and tries to
figure out that kind of stuff?

Oh, right, guys like me sitting in their garage. Spiritual kin of Woz.

My kidding-but-not-really musing is that I've been an employee of 12+
different companies in my life, and I've seen how things work in practical
terms.

The biggest security penetration vector that can't be digitized is human
behavior, because if you act like you belong and your badge looks like you
belong, yippee! Now you've got physical access, and that's 9/10s of any
penetration objective. I mean, if I was a KGB agent, that's how I'd think
about these things...

