3. Answer the following questions:

1) What is OCR?

2) What are three essential elements to OCR technology?

3) What does OCR software do with the images?

4) What is the function of synthesizer in the OCR system?

5) Where is the final information stored?

6) What does the recognition process take into account?

7) Why does OCR system replace word “tke” in the beginning of the sentence by “the”?

8) What techniques does OCR use in word-checking?

9) What do temporary files in OCR system contain?

10) Is there any way out for blind or visually impaired users?

Practical Lesson 2: “Source data automation”

1. Read the text. Fill in the missing words from the box:

identify electrical predefined checks familiar binary capable application text-to-voice processed editing original entire efficient

Source data automation

Source data automation, or source data collection, refers to procedures and equipment designed to make the input process more 1_____________ by eliminating the manual entry of data. Instead of a person entering data using a keyboard, source data automation equipment captures data directly from its 2___________form. The original form is called a source document. In addition to making the input process more efficient, source data automation usually results in a higher input accuracy rate.

An image scanner, sometimes called a page scanner, is an input device that can electronically capture an 3____________ page of text or images such as photograph or art work. The scanner converts the text or images on the original document into digital data that can be stored on a disk and 4______________ by the computer. The digitised data can be printed, displayed separately, or merged into another document for 5_________________.

Optical recognition devices use a light source to read codes, marks, and characters and convert them into digital data that can be processed by computer. Optical codes use a pattern or symbols to represent data. The most common optical code is the bar code. Most of us are 6________________ with the “zebra-striped” Universal Product Code (UPC), which appears on most supermarket products. It consists of a set of vertical lines and spaces of different widths. The bar code reader uses the light pattern from the bar code lines to 7_______________the item. The UPC bar code, used for grocery and retail items, can be translated into a ten-digit number that identifies the product manufacturer and product number.

Optical character recognition (OCR) devices are scanners that read typewritten, computer-printed, and in some cases hand-printed characters from ordinary documents.

A number of optical character recognition (OCR) systems are known. Typically, such systems comprise apparatus for scanning a page of printed text and performing a character recognition process on a bit-mapped image of the text, which is a pixel-by-pixel representation of the overall image in a 8____________ form. The recognition system reads characters of a character code line by framing and recognizing the characters within the image data. During the recognition process, the document is analyzed for several key factors such as layout, fonts, text and graphics. The document is then converted into an electronic format that can be edited with 9_____________ software. The output image is then supplied to a computer or other processing device, which performs an OCR algorithm on the scanned image. The document can be of many different languages, forms and features. The purpose of the OCR algorithm is to produce an electronic document comprising a collection of recognized words that are capable of being edited. In general, electronic reading machines using computer-based optical character recognition (OCR) comprises personal computers outfitted with computer scanners, optical character recognition software, and computerized 10 ____________ hardware or software.

The OCR devices scan the shape of a character, compare it with a 11_____________ shape stored in memory, and convert the character into the corresponding computer code. They use a light source to read special characters and convert them into 12______________ signals to be sent to the CPU. The characters can be read by both humans and machines. They are often found on sales tags in department stores or imprinted on credit card slips.

In large department stores you can see a device called the wand reader. It is 13_______________ to read OCR optical characters. After data from a retail tag has been read, the computer system can automatically and quickly pull together the information needed for billing purposes.

Wands are an extremely promising alternative to key input because they eliminate one more intermediate step between “data” and “processing” — that of key entry.

Magnetic ink character recognition (MICR) characters use special ink that can be magnetized during processing. MICR is used almost exclusively by the banking industry for processing 14_____________ . Blank checks already have the bank code, account number, and check number printed in MICR characters across the bottom. When the check is processed by the bank, the amount of the check is also printed in the lower right corner. Together, this information is read by MICR reader/sorter machines as part of the check- clearing process.