JP3088036B2 - Address reading sorting machine - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an address reading / sorting machine for reading an address such as an address described above from a conveyed mail and sorting the mail using the read address.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art The mail sorting business can be roughly classified into a dispatching job, which is a sorting job for sending collected mail to a post office of a destination, and a sorting job, for delivering an arrived mail. There are some delivery segment services. Conventionally, the postal sorting service has been largely automated by a postal code automatic reading sorting machine, but the automation of the delivery sorting service has been delayed.

However, in recent years, in addition to the function of a postal code automatic reading / sorting machine, a mail address, such as a town name, a street, or a kanji character of a block code, is read directly by an OCR so that the mail can be read at the delivery zone level. A system has been developed that automates the division up to (automation of the delivery division business).

In such an apparatus, in order to search for an address, a word is used as a candidate and an address is obtained by combining the word. However, in order to use the word as a candidate, a ward name (city name), A character string was searched from a database (address dictionary) in which town name information was registered. Words other than the originally existing ward name (city name) and town name were not registered in the address dictionary.

[0005] Conventionally, words other than the correct ward name (city name) and town name have not been registered. Therefore, there are errors in writing the ward name (city name) and town name, and for postal items whose description method differs from the registered word. On the other hand, the character string cannot be determined to be a ward name (city name) or a town name, and there is a disadvantage that the address reading rate is reduced.

For example, with respect to the address of “Ota-ku Nakarokugo”, similar addresses such as “Ota-ku” as “Ota-ku” and “Nakarokugo” as “Chokurokugo” due to typographical errors and personal writing habits. If it is written, "Ota Ward" and "Naka Rokurogo" are registered in the address dictionary because "Ota Ward" and "Naka Rokurogo" are registered.
Could not be identified as an address.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION As described above, according to the present invention, the address of a kanji represented by an erroneous writing is read.
The correct address corresponding to the incorrect address
As a result, the address recognition rate is poor,
But the efficiency of the classification process is to remove the disadvantage of bad, wrong
Kanji aliases written in kanji
When the is read, the exact address corresponding to the kanji alias
Name can be output as recognition result, address recognition rate
And to provide a better Hakare and address attained the efficiency of sorting reader sorter.

[0008]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An address reading / sorting machine according to the present invention reads an address described above from a conveyed mail and performs sorting using the read address. Mistakes in the address and this exact address
Storage means for preliminarily storing kanji aliases represented by a character string in association with each other, reading means for reading an address described in the mail, storing the address read by this reading means and the storage means in the storage means Determining means for determining whether the correct address or alias matches the address, or the alias, if the address read by the reading means matches the alias, It comprises output means for outputting a corresponding correct address as a recognition result , and classification means for performing classification in accordance with the correct address output by the output means.

An address recognition device according to the present invention provides an accurate address and a kanji which is erroneously described for the accurate address.
Shaped alias and storage means storing in advance in association, reading means for reading the address listed in the mailpiece, the exact stored in address and the memory means read by the reading means Determining means for determining whether the address or the alias matches; and, if the determination result by the determining means indicates that the address read by the reading means matches the alias, an accurate address corresponding to the kanji alias is obtained. It comprises output means for outputting an address as a recognition result .

[0010]

[0011]

[Action] The present invention reads the address listed thereon from mailpiece to be transported, in which performs classification by using the read address, the exact address, mistakes on this exact address Is stored in the storage means in advance in association with the alias of the kanji represented by the character string, and the address described in the mail is read by the reading means, and the read address and the address stored in the storage means are stored. determine the exact address or alias match, the judgment result, this is when the address and the alias read by said reading means coincides
An accurate address corresponding to the alias of the Chinese character is output as a recognition result , and classification is performed according to the output accurate address. According to the present invention, an accurate address and an alias of a kanji that is erroneously described for the accurate address are stored in advance in a storage unit, and the reading of the address described in the mail is read by the reading unit. Then, it is determined whether the read address matches the correct address or the alias stored in the storage unit. If the determination result indicates that the address read by the reading unit matches the alias, Is to output an accurate address corresponding to the kanji alias as a recognition result .

[0012]

An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 2 shows an automatic mail sorting machine as an address reading sorting machine according to the present invention, which has the following configuration. That is, the postcard is supplied to the supply unit 1 in a lump and standing state,
A postal matter P ... such as a sealed letter is set. The postal matter P of the supply unit 1 is sequentially taken out and conveyed one by one from the foremost postal matter P by the takeout unit 2 and read by the reading unit (reading means) 4 arranged in the middle of the take-in conveyance path 3. The postal code and address information (address information) assigned to P are read. The reading section 4 discriminates the postal code and address information by performing a photoelectric conversion on the postal code and address information on the postal matter P, and recognizing a character pattern according to the output of the photoelectric conversion section 4a. This is a well-known device including a determination unit 4b. Next, the postal matter P that has passed through the reading unit 4 is transported to the sorting unit (sorting unit) 11 via the transport path 3.

The sorting section 11 includes a plurality of sorting transport paths 5 vertically provided by a gate mechanism (not shown).
a, .about.5 g can be selectively sorted based on the read result of the postal code and address information.

A plurality of pockets (collection boxes) 6 are provided below the sectioned transport paths 5a to 5f along the lower surface thereof.
Are arranged in a plurality of stages (A-stage, up to G-stage), and the postal matter P sent to the sorting transport paths 5a, 5g is placed in a predetermined pocket 6 based on the reading result of the reading unit 4. It is being sorted and collected. Note that the transport paths 3, 5a,
, A transport detector group (not shown) for detecting the transport of the mail P on the transport path is provided.

Address information and the like are written on the surface of the mail P. The address information is composed of a plurality of lines of character information. In such a postal matter P, an address such as "ward, city name", "town name", and "address" to be read as address information (for example, as shown in FIG. 3, "1-2-3 Nakarokugo, Ota-ku" The example of a postal item in which the sender mistakenly wrote the place name "1-2-3 Nakarokugo, Ota-ku" by the sender) is described. An operator panel 7 as an operation panel is provided above the supply section 1.

FIG. 1 shows an electric circuit. That is, the control section 31 reads out the section designation data corresponding to the address information supplied from the discriminating section 4b using the section designation table stored in the memory 32, and reads the read section designation data. The mail P is transported to the pockets 6,... Corresponding to the mails (addresses of the pockets 6,...). For example, by outputting a division gate control signal in response to a conveyance detection signal from a conveyance detector (not shown) in the middle of the conveyance path 3, the driver 33 is used to output the division gate control signal.
, 9 ... are controlled. The memory 32 stores the postal codes and the addresses of the pockets 6, etc. (division designation data) corresponding to each piece of address information as the division designation table. Further, the control section 31 controls the entire transport system by driving the transport mechanism section 36 such as the transport path 3 by the driver 35. Next, the photoelectric conversion unit 4a and the determination unit 4b of the reading unit 4
Will be described with reference to FIG.

That is, the photoelectric conversion section 4a obtains a pattern signal by optically scanning the postal matter P and photoelectrically converting the same. For example, a light source for irradiating light on the postal matter P; It comprises a self-scanning CCD image sensor or the like which receives the reflected light and converts it into an electric signal.

The output of the photoelectric conversion section 4a is supplied to a determination section 4b. The determination unit 4b, address area detecting unit 42, the character recognition unit 43, street name recognition unit (determination hand
Stage, output means) 44, an address dictionary (storage means) 45, a chome, a block recognition section 46, a chome, a block dictionary 47, and an address recognition section 48.

The address area detecting section 42 detects the mail P
Is known, which detects the area in which the address information is described from the information described in the above section, based on the shape, position, etc. of the area. The determination result of the address area detection unit 42, for example, the coordinate value of the determined area is output to the selection circuit 51 in the character recognition unit 43. The output of the photoelectric conversion unit 4a is output to the binarization circuit 5 in the character recognition unit 43.
0 is output.

The character recognition unit 43 includes the photoelectric conversion unit 4
a, a binarization signal from the binarization circuit 20 corresponding to the coordinate information supplied from the address area detection unit 42, or the mode selection key 26 , A selection circuit 51 for selectively outputting a binarized signal from the binarization circuit 20 in an area corresponding to the selected content, and address information corresponding to the address area supplied from the selection circuit 51 A character detection and extraction circuit 52 for detecting and extracting characters of the line image one by one, that is, detecting and extracting character information corresponding to an address, and character information detected and extracted from the character detection and extraction circuit 52. And a character information supplied from the normalization circuit 53, for example, by a matching method with a reference pattern for alphabets and numerals in the dictionary 55. Te letter is constituted by recognizing circuit 54 characters like numbers.

The output of the character recognition unit 43, that is, the output of the recognition circuit 54, is supplied to a town name recognition unit 44, a chome, and a block recognition unit 46. The street name recognizing unit 44 recognizes a street name (Nakorokugo, Ota-ku) based on the address read from the address dictionary 45 with respect to the recognized characters supplied from the character recognizing unit 43. It is output to the block recognition unit 46 and the address recognition unit 48. As shown in FIG. 5, the address dictionary 45 is composed of a plurality of hierarchies. In the 0th and 1st layers, the name of the city where the sorting machine is installed and the name of the ward or city are registered. Is registered with the names of all the towns handled by this sorting machine in that ward or city.

The address dictionary 45 contains similar kanji (an kanji that would be described due to erroneous writing or personal writing habits) as a kanji alias (modified kanji) in addition to the official kanji name and katakana name; (A town name other than a legitimate town name that substitutes characters that are likely to be misread or other characters) is also registered. When a character registered as a kanji alias is a character not registered in the character dictionary, another character having a shape similar to that of the character may be substituted.

For example, the 0th layer is Tokyo (official name of Kanji) and Tokyo (official name of Katakana), and the 1st layer is Ota-ku (official name of Kanji), otaku (official name of Katakana), and Ota-ku (alias of Kanji). ), The second tier is Nakarokugo (official name of Kanji),
Registered are Nakarokugo (official name of Katakana), Churokugo (alias of kanji), Higashirokugo (official name of kanji), Higashikurokugo (official name of katakana), and so on.

The above-mentioned block / block recognition unit 46 performs a block / block dictionary 47 for recognition characters supplied from the character recognition unit 43 after the town name specified by the town name recognition result supplied from the town name recognition unit 44. Recognize the numbers and delimiters (chome, number, number,-, ..., etc.) read out from the address recognition unit 48. The recognition result is output to the address recognition unit 48. The chome and block dictionary 47 stores standard patterns corresponding to blocks and numbers of numbers and delimiters (chome, numbers, numbers,-, ..., etc.).

The address recognizing section 48 includes the street name recognizing section 4.
The address is recognized based on the town name and the above-mentioned street supplied from the block 4 and the street and the block supplied from the block recognition section 46, and the data indicating the section designation data for the address, that is, the data indicating the pocket 6, etc. in the section 11 at the subsequent stage. Is output.

FIG. 6 shows the result of character detection cutout by the character detection cutout circuit 52. In FIG. 6, character cuts (referred to as nodes) of the cutout result are represented by numbers, and character candidates (referred to as arcs) existing between the nodes are represented by alphabets. FIG. 7 shows an example of the result of performing the character identification processing on each of the character candidates (arcs). In this case, a character candidate in a case where “go” is detected and cut out as two characters is also obtained.

In order to recognize an address, it is necessary that an array of arcs from which the address can be read exists in this character identification candidate matrix. In this example, all the described characters are present in the third candidate, and it can be seen that the arc sequence is “abcdeg” and becomes “Nakarokugo, Ota-ku”. As an actual process, an arc sequence that matches a word described in the address dictionary 45 is obtained from the position of each node,
An address is determined by establishing a connection according to a hierarchical rule in the address dictionary 45 for address identification.

Next, the operation in such a configuration will be described with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG. For example, the control unit 31 controls the drive of the transport mechanism unit 36 in response to the turning on of a start switch (not shown) of the operation panel 7 so that the postal matter P accumulated in the supply unit 1 becomes 1
The paper is taken out by the take-out unit 2 one by one, and is conveyed along the conveyance path 3. During this transport, the address information on the mail P is read by the reading unit 4. Then, the control section 31 reads the section designation data corresponding to the address information supplied from the reading section 4, and controls the transport of the mail P to the pockets 6,... Corresponding to the section designation data.

That is, the photoelectric conversion section 4a obtains a pattern signal by optically scanning the postal matter P and performing photoelectric conversion, and outputs the pattern signal to the address area detection section 42 and the character recognition section 43. The address area detection unit 42 detects an area in which address information is described from the information described in the mail P, based on the shape, position, and the like of the area, and sends the detection result to the character recognition unit 43. Output.

The character recognizing unit 43 sequentially performs binarization of the pattern signal supplied from the photoelectric conversion unit 4a, character detection, and character recognition using the detection result of the area supplied from the address area detecting unit 42. The result of the character recognition is output to the town name recognition unit 44, the chome, and the block recognition unit 46.

The town name recognizing unit 44 stores the character identification candidate matrix of each character supplied from the character recognizing unit 43 in an internal memory, and combines each character with the character identification candidate matrix stored in the internal memory (candidate character). , And outputs the candidate character having the highest score to the street, block recognition unit 46, and address recognition unit 48 as the recognition result of the town name.

The street recognition section 46 reads the recognition characters supplied from the character recognition section 43 after the street name specified by the street name recognition result supplied from the street name recognition section 44 from the street and block dictionary 47. Recognized numbers and delimiters (chome, number, number,-, ..., etc.) are output, and the recognition result is output to the address recognition unit 48.

The address recognizing section 48 recognizes an address based on the street name and the street supplied from the street name recognizing section 44 and the street and the block supplied from the block recognizing section 46, and designates the section designation data for the address, that is, the subsequent section. Data indicating the pockets 6,...

The town name recognizing section 44 recognizes "Ota Ward" regardless of the recognition result of the character recognizing section 43, "Ota Ward" or "Ota Ward", and "Naka Rokugo" and "Naka Rogo." Regarding any of the six townships, it is recognized as Naka Nakasato.

Then, the control unit 31 responds to the read sorting designation data and the detection signal of the transport detector to set the sorting gate 9.
, The postal matter P is accumulated in the pockets 6 corresponding to the address information.

That is, the town name recognizing unit 44 checks whether each combination of the arcs "abcd" matches the contents of the first layer, that is, "Ota-ku" and "Ota-ku". The process proceeds to the next step, and if they do not match, reject processing is performed.

Further, in the case where the names match, the town name recognizing unit 44 determines each combination of the arcs (d to h) after the arcs (a to c) determined to be "Ota Ward" or "Ota Ward" and the second combination. A match with each content of the layer is checked, candidates are extracted, and a candidate having the highest score is output as an address from the similarity, the rank of each candidate character, the arrangement of arcs, and the like. For example, it is recognized that “Naka-rokugo” is “Naka-rokugo” regardless of whether it is “Naka-rokugo” or “Chokurokugo”.

As described above, by registering a street name other than a legitimate street name that is difficult to appear as a character candidate due to erroneous writing or personal writing habits in the address dictionary, the recognition rate at the time of address recognition is improved. Leads to improved reading and reduced misreading.

[0040]

As described in detail above, according to the present invention,
Misprinted address, that is, the distinction between kanji and kanji
When the first name is read, the exact
Address can be output as recognition result, address recognition
It is possible to provide an address reading / sorting machine capable of improving the rate and improving the efficiency of the sorting process.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an entire configuration of an automatic mail sorting machine according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view showing the configuration of the automatic mail sorting machine shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of address description of the postal matter in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a determination unit in FIG. 1;

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a storage example of the address dictionary of FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of character detection cutout by the character detection cutout circuit of FIG. 4;

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of a character identification candidate matrix obtained by the town name recognition unit in FIG. 4;

FIG. 8 is a flowchart for explaining processing of a town name recognition unit in FIG. 4;

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Supply part, P ... Mail, 2 ... Extraction part, 3 ... Extraction conveyance path, 4 ... Reading part, 4a ... Photoelectric conversion part, 4b ... Judgment part, 5
a, ... sectioned conveyance path, 6, ... pocket, 9 ... sectioned gate, 11 ... sectioned section, 31 ... control section, 43 ... character recognition section, 44 ... town name recognition section, 45 ... address dictionary, 46 ... chome ,
Block recognition unit, 47 ... Chome, Block dictionary, 48 ... Address recognition unit.

Claims (2)

(57) [Claims] An address reading and sorting machine which reads an address described above from a conveyed mail and performs sorting using the read address. Table by mistake
A storage unit that stores in advance the kanji aliases to be written in association with each other, a reading unit that reads an address described in the postal matter, an address read by the reading unit, and the storage unit. Determining means for determining whether the stored correct address or alias matches; if the determination result by the determining means shows that the address read by the reading means and the alias match , Alias
An address reading / sorting machine comprising: output means for outputting a corresponding accurate address as a recognition result ; and sorting means for performing classification according to the accurate address output by the output means. 2. The exact address and, for this exact address,
Storage means for preliminarily storing kanji aliases written in error by associating them; reading means for reading an address written on a mail; address reading by this reading means and the storage means A determination unit that determines whether the correct address or alias stored in the address unit matches the address. If the address read by the reading unit matches the alias, a result of the determination by the determination unit matches the kanji. An alias for
Output means for outputting a corresponding correct address as a recognition result .