Home » Guides » Software » Office Software » OCR Software Basics

OCR Software Basics

Learn more about OCR software basics

By Carol Francois
Plan to spend time to learn more about OCR software. These products have improved dramatically and are now in widespread use to reduce data entry time for accounts payable invoices, barcoding inventory, control of shipment locations and more. Investigate the various methods that can save your firm time and money.

OCR software basics requires an understanding of the different software options and a clear understanding of your firms needs and how it will be implemented in your firm. Pay attention to the responses from your front line staff to evaluate the potential problems with an OCR software implementation. Read the three steps below to learn more about OCR software.

1. Download optical recognition software.

2. Register for a course in optical recognition software.

3. Explore an optical recognition software supplier directory.

 

Test optical recognition software

Write down a list of the features you require from an optical recognition software. Include all the document formats, sizes and the orientations. Think about the number of files, rate per day and the number of users who will need the OCR software installed on their computers.
Try: Download a demonstration version of the OCR software. Iris Link and Abbyy are both well known OCR software providers. Install the software and change your business practice to incorporate OCR software. Evaluate the two software products to determine which works best for your firm.

Take a class in optical recognition software

Register for an optical character recognition software course. Look at the different courses covering the concept of optical text scanning and the impact of optical document imaging on the document storage industry. Hand's on training is critical when teaching adults software. Make sure the classes contain an exercise portion and are not lecture based.
Try: Look at the online courses offered by Simple OCR. Contact Parascript to arrange for a training session on your OCR software. Both firms provide OCR software products and optical text scanning. Institute a schedule of training sessions, hosted by staff who attended the course on a monthly basis. They can provide a presentation to the other staff on one specific feature they learned about in the course.

Look at a directory of optical recognition software suppliers

Review the directory of optical document recognition software suppliers and attend presentations of their optical document scanning equipment to understand more about this technology and its impact on the business world. Optical document recognition technology involves both hardware and software and the more knowledge you have, the better.
Try: Invest the time to expand your knowledge of OCR software suppliers in your area. Free OCR and DMoz both provide a directory to suppliers and distributors of OCR software related products. The implementation of optical text recognition can save your firm significant time in data entry.

 

  • OCR software basics are important to understand before making a selection of software products and features. It is better to investigate and learn first, than to make a decision in haste that is not satisfactory.

Copyright © 2011 Business.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved.