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Using OCD to copy handwritten text into Times New Roman

Discussion in 'Windows - Software discussion' started by Kafka, Jun 1, 2019.

  1. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    I have a very large number of letters written by father during the war. My brother started typing them into Word but gave up. Is there software (OCD) which would enable me to scan the letters into Word in Times new roman or similar?
     
  2. ddp

    ddp Moderator Staff Member

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    what scanner/printer do you have?
     
  3. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    I have a Canoscan Lide220 scanner and a Canon PIXMA op8760 printer.
     
  4. ddp

    ddp Moderator Staff Member

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    are you certain it is op & not ip?
     
  5. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    Sorry, a slip of the finger. It is an ip.
     
  6. ddp

    ddp Moderator Staff Member

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    have you tried to scan a doc as a jpeg or pdf then hi-lite the text on the result then paste it into word? have you thought to use an online ocr converter?
     
  7. Sophocles

    Sophocles Senior member

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  8. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    Thanks ddp and Sophocles. I will experiment with your suggestions.
     
  9. wither 1

    wither 1 Regular member

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    My HP scanners give me the option to save a scan directly to Word or PDF. I looked at the manual for your 220 scanner and it looks like you can scan to PDF. If you have Adobe Reader X installed, I find that I can copy text from a PDF file directly into Word.
     
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2023
  10. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    Yes, I can scan to PDF. I checked out "free" OCR converters and they all turned out to be expensive. I trialled one and the result was unintelligible (perhaps due to my handwriting). I have Adobe Reader installed but it is the free version. The cost of getting the version which converts a PDF to Word is much too expensive, especially as I cannot be sure that the result will be intelligible.
     
  11. ddp

    ddp Moderator Staff Member

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    what version of adobe reader & word do you have? I have adobe reader 11(free version) & word 2003. I opened a pdf book saved on computer, hi-lited a text page then pasted to word with no problem.
     
  12. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    I have no difficulty in scanning documents a pdf. I had hoped that I could have handwritten pages turned into Times New Roman.
     
  13. wither 1

    wither 1 Regular member

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    I don't understand. If you copy the text to Word, you can adjust the font size. Are you talking about changing the size of the lettering in the serif style the letters were written in?
     
  14. Kafka

    Kafka Regular member

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    The documents I wish to make Times New Roman are letters written in long hand by me 50 years ago. I would like to convert the hand written text to normal print format. Perhaps this isn't realistic?
     
  15. wither 1

    wither 1 Regular member

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  16. scorpNZ

    scorpNZ Active member

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    Don't know if it will do the job however notepad xx is for coding etc so converting to another type should be child's play
    https://notepad-plus-plus.org
    Conversion to a pdf perhaps libra office or some other opensource i.e free office software.There are plugins available to convert.I use it to convert xml to pdf, never tried anything else. Comes as .exe or portable on windows Is cross platform i.e operating systems for linux & i believe mobile as well as mac,same with notepad
     
  17. wither 1

    wither 1 Regular member

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    I wonder how Kafka has made out on this subject.
     
  18. Sophocles

    Sophocles Senior member

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    Probably not very well because I doubt that he's going to find an application that can copy cursive writing to text. Eve if it's in print it would have to be in precise block letters. I've converted written text from images to editable text but the images contained clear type lettering. He would probably do better if he could find a stenographer with good typing skills.

    And that just gave me an idea. Why not use a speech to text software? He can read into a microphone and have his computer do the rest.

    https://www.lifewire.com/best-speech-to-text-software-4688519
     
  19. wither 1

    wither 1 Regular member

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    I gave him a link to an app that supposedly does the cursive to text.

    I like your second idea.
     
  20. Sophocles

    Sophocles Senior member

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    The problem with cursive is everyone writes differently and I don't think OCR software is able to convert more than a few words at a time. Maybe you could help find some more speech to text options?
     

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