With some of the later versions of OmniPage or Fine Reader, one can have
a
sighted person draw a rectangle around screen shots and other blocks of
text
drawn differently than the rest of the text and have them recognized
separately. This presents three problems though: first, the DPI
problem
Jackie mentions causes a drop in accuracy, second, you need to keep a
spare
sightie around and, third, it may not put the text in a logical place in
your document.
As many of these are code samples, the web site for the book often has
them
online for download and you will find that text you can get from a site
will
be 100% accurate which makes using code samples easier.
After the multi-month effort on the first Drupal book that Jackie, Jim
Homme
and I had to drag kicking and screaming into an acceptable state for BSO
download, I think that OCR software may still be a generation away from
handling documents with lots of insets, screen shots, epigrams and other
finery that makes visual presentations much more convenient - hopefully,
BSO
will have contracts in place with publishers to get the clean XML for
publisher quality soon enough that we needn't break our ears over
forcing
such difficult examples into our shoe box.
Happy Hacking,
cdh
PS: I did receive a second book on Drupal 6 which will take some time
to
get scanned as Susan, my lovely wife of 21 years, and I are headed off
to
India for a wedding and won't get back to Boston (where I left my
scanner)
until 11/8.
Chris Hofstader
CUNY, BSO, ATG, Odds and Ends
email: cdh@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Blog: http://www.blindconfidential.blogspot.com
Skype: BlindChristian
phone: 727-896-6393
-----Original Message-----
From: programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:programmingblind-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Jackie
McBride
Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 11:25 AM
To: programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: Reading Embedded ScreenShots of code in Website Articles
Unfortunately, even the OCR packages don't normally do a very good job
on these damn screenshots. Some come out better than others but
they're all far from good. I've had horrible problems in learnin some
computer-related stuff cuz of 'em. The problem is that the screenshot
resolution is so low (like 72 d p i) & OCR does not do well w/that
sort of low res. Also, often they contain additional fine lines,
further degrading the print. I often do the optacon thing, which is
slow but gets the job done. I understand many don't have that option.
On 10/16/08, Ricks Place <OFBGMail@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Thanks Everett:
I have an OCR on my Scanner / Printer and might try that. It messed up
some
of the numbers on a print version of my Resume though but as the sports
guys
are fond of saying, it is what it is - grin.
Rick USA
----- Original Message -----
From: "E.J. Zufelt" <everett@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 10:46 AM
Subject: Re: Reading Embedded ScreenShots of code in Website Articles
Kurzweil, last I checked, was even more. The alternative, one that I
use
periodically, is to print the document and then run it through a
scanner
that comes with OCR software. I have a Fujitsu ScanSnap s500 (not
sure
on
the model). It was $400 and comes with Abby Finereader. It does 16
double sided pages / minute.
HTH,
Everett
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ricks Place" <OFBGMail@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 11:41 AM
Subject: Re: Reading Embedded ScreenShots of code in Website Articles
Hi Everett: Just a note, did you see the price of Open Book! over
$900!
What a rip.
There should be a low cost piece of software out there but I've not
found
it yet. Guess they get big bucks for pattern recognition apps.
I will have my sighted friend read it to me and give him a beer, a
lot
cheaper at least - grin.
An OCR for e-text Might be a good project some day.
Rick USA
----- Original Message -----
From: "E.J. Zufelt" <everett@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 9:21 AM
Subject: Re: Reading Embedded ScreenShots of code in Website Articles
Good morning,
If you have an application like OpenBook or Kurzweil you can print
the
article to that application's virtual printer and it should do the
OCR
for you.
HTH,
Everett
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ricks Place" <OFBGMail@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2008 10:04 AM
Subject: Reading Embedded ScreenShots of code in Website Articles
Hi:
Reading a Microsoft Article it has figure 1, figure 2 etc as
examples
of
code which, of course, does not read with Windoweyes. Are you aware
of
any software to reade these items or a handy OCR or something that
will
reproduce them in text?
My printer has a OCR but I used it once and it rearranged some
numbers,
not good for code of math formulas.
Any ideas? Otherwise I have a sighted person to read me the
pictures,
or
screen shots, and I can type them out. This is for a introduction to
Neural Networks project published in the Microsoft Magazine in
Vb.net.
Thanks:
Rick USA
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Change the world--1 deed at a time
Jackie McBride
Check out my homepage at:
www.abletec.serverheaven.net
& please join my fight against breast cancer
<http://teamacs.acsevents.org/site/TR?px=1790196&pg=personal&fr_id=3489>
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