At the grocery just now, and they have the new impersonal
cash registers where you check out for yourself.  Same
type as I saw at [ex-]Kmart some months back.

So I'm scanning my items, and I think about the 2 mangoes
I have -- how would it handle these?  Get to it (last item)
and there's a button that says "produce".  Cool.  It then
asks me for the label/item number for the produce item,
which I don't have, but it offers me a button: "No Label".
So far so good.  Then it asks me to place the item on the
scanner (which is also a scale), and then comes back to me
with the message: "Please wait".

I was expecting one of the attendants to come up, but I
instead got a message: "Place item in bag".  Okay, now I'm
confused, but I play along.  It takes me back to the item
list and there it is:  2 mangoes (4/$1.00) = $0.50.

Perfecto!

But how?  Is there some form of image recognition going on
here?  I can't think of anything else, other than maybe some
attendant with a camera helping out by plugging in the correct
item number for me remotely.
Or maybe I'll bite into the mango and find a PIC with a
wireless transmitter sending out an ID signal to the cash
register? :-)

So where are the gurus of this technology?

Cheers,
-Neil.

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