Contact us if you have order forms, reports, contracts, application forms, reply cards (campaigns) or similar material that you want to convert quickly into a database.
For interpreting forms we normally use flexible data-capture technology, as this does not require the registration marks normally used with fixed-form technology, for example on surveys.
Interpreting forms with flexible data-capture technology
Interpretation with flexible data-capture technology works quite differently from the interpretation of fixed forms, with reference marks and fields in fixed positions. Instead of reading fixed positions, it relies on using OCR to find predefined anchor words, such as "Avtal", "avtalsnr", "Ordernr", "Ordersedel:", "Rapportnr:" or similar, and then setting conditions for locating a suitable character string near the anchor, or at least in relation to it. You set conditions for how the sought-after character string should look, such as the number of characters, which characters are permitted, and so on. See below the anchor word "RAPPORT" in blue and the captured report number in green.
The same type of contract often looks identical, but it only takes one of the contracts being a photocopy, or printed on a different printer, for it to no longer match a template for fixed forms, where the demands for millimetre precision are high. A good example of when this is bound to happen is if you post a PDF containing, say, an application form for a new share issue that is then downloaded by different people and this PDF is subsequently printed on different printers. In that case flexible data-capture technology for semi-structured forms is preferable instead.