TWAIN

TWAIN, short for Toolkit Without An Interesting Name, is Communication standard used between software application and imaging devices such as scanners and digital cameras. It was developed by TWAIN Working Group, aiming to build a standard with multiple platforms support, assured equipment compatibility, software and hardware support, extendibility support, easy-to-use for both developers & end users, and multiple format support.

Twain plays a crucial role between software applications and imaging devices. It provides a standard software protocol and applications programming interface for the software developers and hardware manufacturers, avoiding incompatible problem between the system and equipment. Twain protocol provides software support for the operating system, making image acquisition much easier from TWAIN compatible device through TWAIN protocol interface and do not need to consider the functional differences.

You may acquire images through TWAIN compatible devices across multiple development environment and platforms with Yiigo.Image for .NET and Yiigo .NET TWAIN Plugin.

Twain has four elements: hardware, Source, Source Manager and Software and we call hardware interface of TWAIN Source. Source Manager is often used for choosing and managing source of data from different hardware manufacturers. However, on windows OS, Source Manager, usually, is a dll. TWAIN interface of TWAIN software does not directly call Hardware Factory, instead, through the Source Manager. After you choose Image Acquire in TWAIN applications, a series of negotiations to decide how to transmit data through the TWAIN software and hardware: Software need to describe image it needs, while hardware need to image it provides. Once image format confirmed by both Software and hardware, it would be send to source. And then, Source can now set scanning options, and begins scanning.

TWAIN provides support for: