Scan or Print to a PDF file

[Allan K.]

Hi.

I have a friend who wants to get rid of tons of personal documents
such as receipts, legal papers, employment papers, etc. so she could
make use of the space that occupy them, not to mention the security it
could bring...

My first question has to be whether a scanner that also functions as a
copying machine is already available, that is, with automatic feeders
and trays so you don't have to feed documents one at a time. And the
second question is whether that available scanning machine could print
to a file, perhaps a pdf file. But at this point it really doesn't
matter if it outputs to a tif or jpg file initially as long as it's no
more than 2M size. Hmmm.. maybe the size is unimportant at this time.

Thanks in advance for any input.

 

[Don]

Both HP and Epson make scanners with document feeders. They'll all save to
a multitude of file formats, including TIFF and JPEG, but usually not to
PDF. To do that you'll have to buy Adobe's Acrobat software. Well woth the
investment if you have a lot of documents to store IMO.

Don

 

[Tim]

Hmmm... Why would he buy Acrobat? ALL included sw scanner bundles include
basic scanning software that will generate a TIF, or other basic image file
format.

Acrobat MIGHT be of value if he had textual documents that he wanted to turn
into PDF (Acrobat) files. With this application Acrobat reads the bits that
make up an 'A' from the scanned image and turns it into an ASCII 'A'. This
functionality is called OCR, or Optical Character Recognition. --- Scanning
in receipts and such would not be a good application for Acrobat's scanning
module.

He's correct in his suggestion that size doesn't matter much money-wise
(hard drives are cheap, but file size might be an issue when you consider
scanning time.

The other issue not raised here is how are they going to be organized after
scanning? Some sort of image database where specific documents can be
indexed and retrieved. OTOH, if the user only wants to group them
broadly --- month, year --- then just folders in the OS will work fine.

Also, the basic consumer scanners mentioned, will only deal with large paper
sizes in an automated manner. Only volume DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT scanners ($$$)
will scan things like taxi cab receipts.

Tim

 

[FRED]

Try Paperport Pro, I've got verion 9 and it scans and stores as pdf files, I
keep all my clients files (I'm in finance) on the hards disk.
cheers

 

[Timothy Lee]

Both HP and Epson make scanners with document feeders. They'll all save to
a multitude of file formats, including TIFF and JPEG, but usually not to
PDF. To do that you'll have to buy Adobe's Acrobat software. Well woth the
investment if you have a lot of documents to store IMO.

Unless, you use something else, there are shareware/freeware progs
available. I have Jaws PDF creator from a computer magazine cover disc.
OpenOffice.org 1.1 and higher has a print to PDF option, I believe newer
versions of MS Office do as well, but I'd rather spend that sort of
money on printing rather than software.

IIRC ghostscript will as well.

 

[Paul-dude]

Definitely the best option is Scan2PDF, it was made for this kind of project
and will make mono PDFs at 30kb per page. It works with ADF scanners and
the free download is at http://www.burrotech.com/scan2pdf.php - if you like
it then it is £35/$49 to purchase.

PD

 

[Allan K.]

Both HP and Epson make scanners with document feeders. They'll all save to
a multitude of file formats, including TIFF and JPEG, but usually not to
PDF. To do that you'll have to buy Adobe's Acrobat software. Well woth the
investment if you have a lot of documents to store IMO.

It is worth the investment if the process doesn't take too much time
and produces the kind of files we would like to see and have easy
access with. When I think about it, this conversion thing not only
concerns people who are engaged in businesses or with professions that
generate a lot of paperwork. I think it could also be applied in our
everyday lives such as the mails we accumulate, documents in school
from kindergarten to adult life, etc. that we wanted to discard but
can't because we might need them at some point. It may also be applied
to the books or magazines we buy but no longer read but feel we might
refer to them later if we give them away. Wouldn't it be nice if you
could save them electronically? Mind you this a cheap processs. It is
inkless. All you need are blank CDs that cost less than a dollar each,
which could save hundreds of pages of documents.

Don

Allan

 

[Allan K.]

Hmmm... Why would he buy Acrobat? ALL included sw scanner bundles include
basic scanning software that will generate a TIF, or other basic image file
format.

Acrobat MIGHT be of value if he had textual documents that he wanted to turn
into PDF (Acrobat) files. With this application Acrobat reads the bits that
make up an 'A' from the scanned image and turns it into an ASCII 'A'. This
functionality is called OCR, or Optical Character Recognition. --- Scanning
in receipts and such would not be a good application for Acrobat's scanning
module.

He's correct in his suggestion that size doesn't matter much money-wise
(hard drives are cheap, but file size might be an issue when you consider
scanning time.

Actually, I've already started the conversion manually in preparation
for the scanner with automatic feeder (we haven't decided yet what
brand) that we plan to buy. At the same time check the generated file
sizes at different settings and resolutions to determine the
appropriate ones for the particular job. No doubt outputting them to
PDF files should be the ideal because of their ability to be organized
into some sort of electronic books that could then be browsed
efficiently. However, there are times when some documents should be
left as is, that is, preserve their original, antique appearance with
the paper texture and all. In this case bitmap files are probably more
appropriate such as a high resolution jpegs with a size no less than 2
megabytes each for a typical document, also anticipating non textual
images in them.

The other issue not raised here is how are they going to be organized after
scanning? Some sort of image database where specific documents can be
indexed and retrieved. OTOH, if the user only wants to group them
broadly --- month, year --- then just folders in the OS will work fine.

That would the least of our concerns for now. Right now the concern is
to convert them to electronic files. I was hoping a scanner with ADF
could do that automatically in groups of 30-50 pages. And I would
assume that filenames are automatically created in series as they are
being scanned. We could rename and organize them later.

Also, the basic consumer scanners mentioned, will only deal with large paper
sizes in an automated manner. Only volume DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT scanners ($$$)
will scan things like taxi cab receipts.

The important thing in the end would be that they are saved as
computer files. Receipts or documents with irregular shapes and sizes
would have to be pasted first on a regular paper, then perhaps copied
on a copying machine before being fed to a scanner.

Tim

Allan

 

[Tim]

NO SALE, Allan. I come from a Doc Man background.

Anyone who starts a conversion process BEFORE knowing how the documents will
be organized, searched and retrieved is in for lots of pain.

BROWSING through PDF files is inefficient and searching across PDF files is
not possible with standard Acrobat sw.

Oh, and pasting or taping receipts for feeding through an ADF will turn the
scanner into a shredder.

Bon Chance
Tim

 

[Mendel Leisk]

Another format you might want to consider: multi-page, 2 bit tiff,
which Vuescan can output. 8 1/2 x 11 documents, scanned at 100 dpi,
which is quite sufficient, are about 100 kb per page.

They can be "opened as a pdf" with adobe acrobat, and saved thus. I
like the quality and universality of the tiff, though.

 

[Gerhard Fuernkranz]

Both HP and Epson make scanners with document feeders. They'll all save to
a multitude of file formats, including TIFF and JPEG, but usually not to
PDF. To do that you'll have to buy Adobe's Acrobat software.

.... or use for instance tiff2ps (see http://www.libtiff.org/tools.html) and
ps2pdf (-> comes with ghostscript, see http://www.ghostscript.com), both are
available for free.

Regards,
Gerhard

 

[Alan]

No doubt outputting them to
PDF files should be the ideal because of their ability to be organized
into some sort of electronic books that could then be browsed
efficiently. However, there are times when some documents should be
left as is, that is, preserve their original, antique appearance with
the paper texture and all. In this case bitmap files are probably more
appropriate such as a high resolution jpegs

There is no advantage to saving as jpeg. If you scan to PDF, what you
get is basically a multi-page jpeg. The resolution can (depends on
your software how) be selected. You have the ability to add a text
layer or annotations to a PDF.

There are organistions that take these kind of files and add an
invisible text layer with the text on it, making it searchable (eg
http://www.digitaldividedata.com/ in Cambodia -- though their text
isn't perfect, it's probably good enough).

 

[Tom Ruben]

Try Paperport Pro, I've got verion 9 and it scans and stores as pdf
files,

If you want to be able to find your documents again easily, make sure
you select PDF Searchable Image as the file type.