18 ms·

Why hasn't this been automated? Digit recognition technology is pretty good and it seems like the forms are pretty standardized.

ant6n 7y ago
Is there a technology that would help ocr-ing standardized forms? I’ve got a couple thousand pages of historical train schedules that i would like to digitize (tabulated, printed data, including symbols/icons), but I’m not sure how to automatically recognize the structured data.
- GijsjanB 7y ago
  I don't know about out-of-the-box ready software. Depending on how much time you have you'd either train your own model with your own ground truth or you can use an open source model. Libraries and archives sometimes make theirs available (I know the Dutch National Archives do). You can train the model and/or HTR the data with software like Transcribus or Kraken (open source).
- jasoncabot 7y ago
  (disclaimer MS employee but nothing to do with this product) You could check out the Azure Forms Recognizer. It's designed to do exactly this and make even training a custom model pretty easy. It's also pretty cheap (free up to 500 pages) so you can always do a quick experiment and see if it does what you need it to https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cognitive-services/form-recognizer/overview https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cognitive-services/fo...
- martyvis 7y ago
  I remember getting some reference software and methods from NIST maybe 20 years ago on handwriting recognition. Never put it into practice, but maybe they have some updated software available
- froindt 7y ago
  I'm curious, what's your interest in the train schedules? One day at an antique shop, I came across a book from ~1910 which had hundreds of pages of annual reports from railroads with many metrics we'd expect to see in the 10-K reports public companies file. The book was published annually, but had much of its data in tables with grouped headers and cells, which could make automated OCR-ing with a good (useful) end result challenging. I think it'd be interesting to map out the Railroad consolidation, track all their financial metrics over time, and do some level of forensic accounting to see if/which companies probably had funny business going on.
  - ant6n 7y ago
    I’ve got European rail schedules, which gives an indication of historical travel patterns. Specifically looking into the development of overnight travel.
th0ma5 7y ago
Probably because 99% accuracy isn't good enough.
- scrollaway 7y ago
  What accuracy do you think humans have? If I give you 1000 handwritten numbers, do you think you'll make less than 10 mistakes?
  - deepnet 7y ago
    They will likely assign the same tasks to multiple people and use an ensemble of human consensus.
  - Arbalest 7y ago
    Run both OCR and human in parallel and double check anomalies
    - saagarjha 7y ago
      I would expect humans to make similar errors.
      - Arnt 7y ago
        AIUI the classic procedure for tasks like this is/was: Hide some graduate students. Tell each to transcribe, and to mark the difficult spots. Give each page to two students. Next, have someone else process the page pairs and resolve conflicts and the marked trouble spots. As long as one of the students notices that a particular spot is difficult to read, the error is discovered and can be handled by someone who isn't numb from transcribing pages of simple numbers.
  - astrobe_ 7y ago
    The forms are in open access, anyone can fill one form, so they surely did consider variations in accuracy (if not plain sabotage). They are probably submitting the same data to multiple people and the cross-checking the submissions. Also, the totals help to filter out submissions with mistakes. One can also add bound checking for individual values (misplaced decimal point, extra digits etc.). I would love to see how they do it, but they'll probably keep it confidential because trolls and other vandals.

ant6n 7y ago

Is there a technology that would help ocr-ing standardized forms? I’ve got a couple thousand pages of historical train schedules that i would like to digitize (tabulated, printed data, including symbols/icons), but I’m not sure how to automatically recognize the structured data.

GijsjanB 7y ago
I don't know about out-of-the-box ready software. Depending on how much time you have you'd either train your own model with your own ground truth or you can use an open source model. Libraries and archives sometimes make theirs available (I know the Dutch National Archives do). You can train the model and/or HTR the data with software like Transcribus or Kraken (open source).
jasoncabot 7y ago
(disclaimer MS employee but nothing to do with this product) You could check out the Azure Forms Recognizer. It's designed to do exactly this and make even training a custom model pretty easy. It's also pretty cheap (free up to 500 pages) so you can always do a quick experiment and see if it does what you need it to https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cognitive-services/form-recognizer/overview https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cognitive-services/fo...
martyvis 7y ago
I remember getting some reference software and methods from NIST maybe 20 years ago on handwriting recognition. Never put it into practice, but maybe they have some updated software available
froindt 7y ago
I'm curious, what's your interest in the train schedules? One day at an antique shop, I came across a book from ~1910 which had hundreds of pages of annual reports from railroads with many metrics we'd expect to see in the 10-K reports public companies file. The book was published annually, but had much of its data in tables with grouped headers and cells, which could make automated OCR-ing with a good (useful) end result challenging. I think it'd be interesting to map out the Railroad consolidation, track all their financial metrics over time, and do some level of forensic accounting to see if/which companies probably had funny business going on.
- ant6n 7y ago
  I’ve got European rail schedules, which gives an indication of historical travel patterns. Specifically looking into the development of overnight travel.

th0ma5 7y ago

Probably because 99% accuracy isn't good enough.

scrollaway 7y ago
What accuracy do you think humans have? If I give you 1000 handwritten numbers, do you think you'll make less than 10 mistakes?
- deepnet 7y ago
  They will likely assign the same tasks to multiple people and use an ensemble of human consensus.
- Arbalest 7y ago
  Run both OCR and human in parallel and double check anomalies
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    I would expect humans to make similar errors.
    - Arnt 7y ago
      AIUI the classic procedure for tasks like this is/was: Hide some graduate students. Tell each to transcribe, and to mark the difficult spots. Give each page to two students. Next, have someone else process the page pairs and resolve conflicts and the marked trouble spots. As long as one of the students notices that a particular spot is difficult to read, the error is discovered and can be handled by someone who isn't numb from transcribing pages of simple numbers.
- astrobe_ 7y ago
  The forms are in open access, anyone can fill one form, so they surely did consider variations in accuracy (if not plain sabotage). They are probably submitting the same data to multiple people and the cross-checking the submissions. Also, the totals help to filter out submissions with mistakes. One can also add bound checking for individual values (misplaced decimal point, extra digits etc.). I would love to see how they do it, but they'll probably keep it confidential because trolls and other vandals.