I Am Stumped.

[Lefty]

Fellas, I have a typewritten manuscript that I want to put on my computer and then edit it so I can publish it on Amazon/Kindle.
The problem is when I scan a page, it's an image and I haven't been able to
put it in a text editor. Well, I did, but it was just gobblygook.
I sure don't want to retype the whole darn thing into the computer.
Any help or insights, greatly appreciated.

[OTM Al]

The key is being able to scan it into a .pdf file in such a way as it is recognized as text, not just an image. It all depends on the software you have with the scanner. Perhaps someone can recommend a good program?

[JustRalph]

http://reviews.cnet.com/4566-3680_7-0.html?filter=500343_5852199_

Cnet has a list of packages at the link above. None are perfect, but they work pretty well nowadays.

Have you considered reading into a voice recognition program?

[Lefty]

Thanks, Guys. Some really good ideas. I shall check them out.
That's why I come here. There are Brains here.

[bigmack]

Here is a free scanner software offering that should do the job:
http://www.freewarefiles.com/TopOCR_program_35680.html

By the way, Happy Birthday. :ThmbUp:

[Lefty]

Thanks, Big Mack, and also for the birthday kudos. My mind is racing with ideas for the future...

[highnote]

Thanks, Big Mack, and also for the birthday kudos. My mind is racing with ideas for the future...


Lefty, I have a 10 year old HP scanner that came with text recognition software. It requires a computer with a parallel port. maybe you can get a USB to Parallel port adaptor cable. You are welcome to have it. I will gladly ship it to you.

Although, a new scanner is probably pretty inexpensive and I imagine the text recognition software has come a long way since 2000.

John

[Tom]

Happy birthday Lefty!

You sound pretty young! :cool:

[Lefty]

swetyjohn, I just bought a new portable scanner. I really want it to work If I can get it to. The problem is, It created the image to a JPEG file. I tried one of the OCI trial softwares and when I scanned for the image, it wasn't there, which means the software couldn't see it. Thinking about going for the voice recognition software if I can't find a way to make this work.
I really do thank you for your kind offer though. I like this scanner because you just feed the paper through it. No worries about lining up anything.

Tom, I am getting younger every day.

[highnote]

That's the name -- Optical Character Recognition -- OCR.

Maybe you could scan the images and send the jpegs to India or China for transcription? Might be inexpensive?

I'll check to see if my newer scanner has OCR capability. If so, I'll let you know if it works.

[Lefty]

I found one that works. Image To Ocr. They give a 3 page trial. That was enough to see that it worked.

Thanks to you all: My Brain Trust.

[Lefty]

I opened the Scanner Software that came with the Scanner and took a better look around. Sure enough the thing will send the scanned image to notepad, or Wordpad or PDF where I can then copy and paste into Open
Office. The reason I didn't discover this sooner is because absolutely nothing about is mentioned in the User Manual. Anyway, this discovery has saved me forty bucks that the other program cost.

I scanned a short story I wrote sometime ago into open Office as part of another book i'm writing.

I will be tackling that novel soon.
Work Work Work

Thanks again, fellas.

[toetoe]

Thanks, Big Mack, and also for the birthday kudos. My mind is racing with ideas for the future...



Um ... I believe those were birthday encomia .... hel-lo? :p



Happy birthday [almost forgot ... :blush: ].

[Lefty]

Not dead yet...
Thanks toe toe