OCR Scanning Software

One of the biggest problems with scanned documents is that the text they contain is not generally in a machine-editable format. This is a serious drawback for many users who would otherwise benefit from digitizing their documents, since it means that users cannot edit nor search the text in their scanned documents.

However, with the prevalence of OCR software, more and more scanner makers are beginning to include OCR technology in their software. OCR scanning software allows the user to scan documents and have them saved directly as text-searchable PDF files, or as editable text documents. Text-searchable PDFs are vastly superior to non-searchable PDF files, as finding specific information in a document is much simpler if you don't have to look through every page.

OCR can also be used for automated data entry. Using OCR scanning software, you can scan your documents and export the text to a database. This technique is often used for invoice and forms processing, and for EOB automation. ICR, which stands for intelligent character recognition, is a type of OCR used primarily for recognizing handwriting and converting it to editable text, and allows users to automatically enter handwritten documents as machine text. If you have standardized documents, such as forms, from which to extract specific information, you can use zonal OCR to specify exactly what data you want extracted and saved, and ignore the rest.

Organizations that deal with a large number of documents every day often utilize batch OCR software. With batch OCR software, the user can specify a large batch of files to be OCRed, and leave the program do the work. Another feature of some batch OCR software is a 'watched folder mode', which allows users to specify folders for the software to monitor; if a new document is scanned or placed into one of these folders, the software will automatically process it and place it in a specified output location. Some batch OCR products are server-based, and can automatically process scanned documents from any user on a network.