The digital copier – which scans and stores the image and then laser prints it instead of picking it up directly on a drum promises to obsolete over time the separate copier, facsimile machine, scanner and printer, and Xerox Corp and Eastman Kodak Co are pulling out all the stops to develop such a machine dubbed Hydra, for Hybrid Document Reproduction Apparatus by Wall Street Journal staffer Laurence Hooper: Ricoh Co and Canon Inc already have products capable of performing all four functions, creating the super print communications server, but offer only facsimile and copying on them at present for lack of the software to tie all the functions together and interface them to personal computers.
