JP5251161B2 - Information processing apparatus, information processing system, and program - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus, an information processing system, and a program.

  In recent years, systems that digitize paper documents and store them as electronic documents have become widespread. In such a system, a document composed of a plurality of pages is often stored in a format that can handle a plurality of pages as one file, such as PDF.

  There is also a system that prints an electronic document stored in this way, fills in a paper document as a print result, digitizes the entry result, and stores it as an updated version of the original electronic document.

  For example, when printing an electronic document registered in a database, the system disclosed in Patent Document 1 adds an image code such as a barcode for identifying the electronic document to the image of the electronic document itself and prints it. To do. In addition, when an image of a paper document is read, the apparatus specifies an electronic document corresponding to the paper document from an image code in the image, and associates the read image with the electronic document (for example, the electronic document). Register as a document revision) in the database.

  In addition, when using a paper document to instruct the addition of a page to a multi-page electronic document, all pages of the paper document corresponding to the original electronic document are prepared, and the added paper page is included in the paper document. An electronic document obtained by inserting it at a position to be added and reading it with a scanner is replaced with the original electronic document.

JP 2004-112524 A

  According to the present invention, even if a paper document corresponding to all pages of an electronic document is not prepared, it is possible to add a page read at a predetermined page position in the electronic document only by reading a paper document corresponding to some pages. The purpose is to do so.

According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided specifying means for specifying a corresponding electronic document corresponding to a document from electronic documents stored in a storage device based on a read image of each page of the document read by the document reading device. Searching for a corresponding image having a similarity equal to or higher than a predetermined threshold with respect to a read image of the page for each page of the original document from the images of the pages of the corresponding electronic document; A means for adding, to the corresponding electronic document in the storage means, a read image in which the corresponding image is not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the document, the page of the read image in the document and and a additional means for adding the read image to a page position specified by the order relationship between the corresponding image is found pages, the specifying unit, the first page of the document The corresponding electronic document is identified by comparing the image with the image of the first page of each electronic document stored in the storage device, and the adding means searches for the first page of the corresponding electronic document by searching the search means. A page having the corresponding image as the first page other than is found in the document, and a page in which the corresponding image is not found is set in advance in the document immediately before and after the found page. If present, the read image of the page for which the corresponding image is not found is inserted into the predetermined one immediately before and immediately after the first page in the corresponding electronic document, and the search means searches The first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and other than the first page of the original If none is found the corresponding image for the page, the additional means, the read image of each page except the first page is added after the last page of the corresponding electronic document, wherein the < An information processing apparatus.

  According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the invention, when a bundle of originals composed of a plurality of originals is read by the original reading device, the read image of each page received from the original reading device. A search is made for a predetermined delimiter image or a representative page image of each electronic document stored in the storage device, and the read image of each page output by the original reading unit based on the searched delimiter image or representative page image Dividing means, and the specifying means specifies the corresponding electronic document corresponding to the document based on the read image divided by the dividing unit into document units.

  According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the invention according to any one of the first and second aspects, the read image of the read image of each page of the document in which the corresponding image is found by the search unit. When the similarity between the corresponding image and the corresponding image is equal to or higher than the threshold and equal to or lower than a predetermined second threshold, the corresponding image in the target electronic document in the storage unit is the read image. It further comprises replacement means for replacing with.

The invention according to claim 4 is a document reading device that reads a document, a storage device that stores one or more electronic documents including images of one or more pages, and reading each page of a document read by the document reading device. Based on the image, a specifying means for specifying a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the original document from the electronic documents stored in the storage device, and a predetermined threshold for the read image of the page for each page of the original document Search means for searching for a corresponding image having a similarity greater than or equal to a value from images of each page of the corresponding electronic document, and the corresponding image was not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the document Means for adding a read image to the corresponding electronic document in the storage means, according to an order relationship between a page of the read image in the document and a page where the corresponding image is found; Look including a an information processing apparatus having, an additional means for adding the read image to a page position specified, the specifying means, each electronic document stored image of the first page of the document in the storage device The corresponding electronic document is identified by comparing the image with the first page image of the first page, and the adding means sets the first page other than the first page of the corresponding electronic document as the corresponding image by the search by the search means. If a page is found in the original and the page in which the corresponding image is not found exists in one of the original documents immediately before and after the found page, the page in which the corresponding image is not found Is inserted into the predetermined one immediately before and immediately after the first page in the corresponding electronic document, for searching by the search means. If the first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and the corresponding image is not found for any page other than the first page of the original, The adding means adds the read image of each page other than the top page to the back of the last page of the corresponding electronic document .

According to the fifth aspect of the invention, the computer specifies a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the original document from the electronic documents stored in the storage device based on the read image of each page of the original document read by the original reading device. Means for searching for a corresponding image having a similarity equal to or higher than a predetermined threshold with respect to the read image of the page, from the images of the pages of the corresponding electronic document, A means for adding, to the corresponding electronic document in the storage device, a read image in which the corresponding image is not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the document, the page of the read image in the document program der for the addition means for adding the read image to a page position specified by the order relation between the corresponding image is found pages, to function as a The specifying unit specifies the corresponding electronic document by comparing the image of the first page of the document with the image of the first page of each electronic document stored in the storage device, and the adding unit includes the As a result of the search by the search means, a page having the corresponding image as the first page other than the first page of the corresponding electronic document is found in the original, and is determined in advance in the original immediately before and after the found page. On the other hand, if there is a page for which the corresponding image is not found, the read image of the page for which the corresponding image is not found is stored in advance in the corresponding electronic document immediately before and after the first page. The first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document by the search by the search means. And when the corresponding image is not found for any page other than the first page of the document, the adding unit converts the read image of each page other than the first page to the last page of the corresponding electronic document. It is a program characterized by being added after .

  According to the invention according to claim 1, 4, or 5, even if a paper document corresponding to all the pages of the electronic document is not prepared, only the paper document corresponding to a part of the page is read in the electronic document. A read page can be added to a predetermined page position.

  According to the second aspect of the present invention, individual electronic documents can be specified even when paper originals are collectively read by the original reading means.

  According to the invention of claim 3, pages in the electronic document can be replaced with a paper document.

  With reference to FIG. 1, an example of the system of the embodiment will be schematically described. The system shown in FIG. 1 includes a document registration / update system 10, a document management system 20, and a multi-function device (devices having functions of a scanner, a printer, a copier, etc.) connected to each other via a network 60 such as a local area network. 30. An image search system 40 and a similarity determination system 50 are provided.

  The document registration / update system 10 is a system for registering an electronic document in the document management system 20 and updating an electronic document registered in the document management system 20. Details of the document registration / update system 10 will be described later. An electronic document is a document composed of electronic data, and is typically a single file. There is a paper document as a concept that is opposed to an electronic document. A paper document is a document composed of images displayed on one or more sheets.

  The document management system 20 is a database that stores electronic documents registered by users. Each electronic document includes image data of one or more pages. The document management system 20 stores each electronic document in association with a unique document ID (identification information). The electronic document is, for example, document data in a multi-page file format such as PDF (Portable Document Format) (that is, a file format in which images of a plurality of pages can be included in one file).

  The multi-function device 30 includes an ADF (Auto Document Feeder). In one example, the ADF includes a document table, a document feeding mechanism, and a reading device that simultaneously reads both the front and back sides of the document. According to such an ADF, the reading device reads both sides of each document and generates image data on each side in conjunction with the document feeding mechanism feeding the documents one by one from the document stack on the document table. To do. As such an ADF, an existing one may be used. Further, the reading device provided in the ADF is not necessarily limited to the one capable of reading both sides simultaneously. If the scanning device is for single-sided scanning, once all the originals placed on the platen are sent and scanned, the originals are turned over, placed on the platen, and read again, so that the images on both sides of each original are scanned. Can be read. Further, the ADF provided in the multifunction machine 30 does not necessarily include a reading device. In the case where the ADF does not include a reading device, an image of a document sent by the ADF one by one is read by a scanner mechanism provided on the platen of the multifunction machine 30.

  The reading device is not limited to the scanner mechanism of the multifunction device as long as it can read a document as an image, such as an image scanner, a document camera, or a digital camera.

  In addition to general functions such as scanning, printing, and copying, the multi-function device 30 has a function of transmitting scanned image data generated by scanning to the document registration / update system 10 for registration or update. This function is realized by, for example, a document transmission program executed by the CPU (central processing unit) of the multifunction machine 30. For example, the program is associated with one menu item in the menu displayed on the operation screen of the multifunction device 30. When the menu item is selected by the user, the program is executed and the multifunction device 30 is executed. Transits to the document transmission mode. In the document transmission mode, for example, the multifunction machine 30 is in a state of waiting for reading a paper document. In this state, when the user sets a document bundle on the ADF and presses the start button of the multifunction machine 30, the documents in the document bundle are read one by one, and the image of each page of the document bundle obtained as a result of this reading is read. The data is collected into multi-page scanned image data by the document transmission program and transmitted to the document registration / update system 10. There are cases where a plurality of paper documents are included in a document bundle set in the ADF. In such a case, the scanned image data transmitted to the document registration / update system 10 is a summary of the reading results of the plurality of paper documents. It becomes. When the original bundle set in the ADF is read and the scanned image data of the read result is transmitted to the document registration / update system 10, the multi-function device 30 returns from the document transmission mode to the normal mode. If the original can be read only one side at a time, the document transmission program reads the original bundle once set in the ADF, stores the read result of the surface obtained as a result, and then turns over and sets the original bundle. Can be generated and rearranged in combination with the stored reading results of the front surface, and multi-page scanned image data arranged in page order can be generated.

  In the above, an example in which a document bundle set in the ADF is read has been described. However, the document transmission program uses the scanned image data obtained by reading the document placed on the platen of the multifunction machine 30 as the document registration / update system 10. May be sent to.

  As another example, the document transmission program of the multifunction machine 30 presents a list of scanned image data stored in the storage device in the multifunction machine 30 on the operation screen, and the scanned image data selected by the user in the list. May be transmitted to the document registration / update system 10.

  The document registration / update system 10 corresponds to each scanned document for each document (hereinafter referred to as “scanned document”) included in the scanned image data sent from the multifunction device 30. It is determined whether or not the electronic document has been registered in the document management system 20. This determination is performed, for example, when the image search system 40 searches the document management system 20 for an electronic document having a representative page with the same image as the representative page of the scanned document. As the representative page, for example, the top (that is, cover) page of the electronic document can be used. Even in the field of document management, there are many examples in which a cover page in which bibliographic items such as a creator and a creation date are prepared is prepared, and individual documents are identified by this cover page.

  If an electronic document having the same image as the representative page of the scanned document as a representative page is found from within the document management system 20, the scanned document is determined to be registered. Otherwise, it is determined to be unregistered. If it is determined that the document has been registered, the document registration / update system 10 updates the electronic document corresponding to the document in the document management system 20 using the image of the scanned document. If it is determined that the document is not registered, the document registration / update system 10 registers the scanned document in the document management system 20 as a new electronic document.

  When a user wants to update an electronic document registered in the document management system 20, the user prepares a paper document including a representative page of the electronic document and a page to be updated (for example, a page to be changed or added). The document may be read into the multifunction device 30 in the document management mode. When the representative page is the first page of the document, the paper document may be set so that, for example, the update target page comes after the representative page.

  In addition, when a new page is added to a specific page position in the electronic document, it is necessary to specify the page position. In such a case, a paper document including not only the representative page and the page to be added but also the page immediately before or immediately after the page to be added (or both) may be read into the multifunction device 30. The order of the pages in the paper document may be made to coincide with the order of the pages in the electronic document after the pages are added.

  In addition, if you want to update multiple electronic documents at the same time, the representative page and the update target page for each electronic document (and other pages for specifying the location of the update target page if necessary) ) Is prepared, and a document bundle obtained by bundling them is read into the multifunction machine 30. Here, each document included in the document bundle includes a representative page and a page to be updated (and another page for specifying the position of the page to be updated, if any) in the updated electronic document. Set it in the same order as the pages.

  The image search system 40 compares the image of each page of the scanned image data received from the document registration / update system 10 with the image of the representative page of each electronic document registered in the document management system 20. Based on this comparison, a page having the same image as the representative page of each electronic page is searched from the scanned image data. For example, if the representative page is the first page or the last page of the document, if a page corresponding to the representative page of the electronic document is found in the scanned image data, the page is separated from each scanned document included in the scanned image data. It becomes. For example, assume that the first page of a document is a representative page. In this case, if a certain page A in the scanned image data matches a representative page of an electronic document, the scanned image data from the page A to the next page immediately before the page that matches the representative page of another electronic document. Each page can be determined as one scanned document page. An electronic document having a representative page that matches page A is determined as a corresponding electronic document corresponding to a scanned document starting from page A. This corresponding electronic document is to be updated by the scanned document. This update process will be described in detail later.

  If no page having an image that matches the representative page of any electronic document is found in the scanned image data, the scanned image data is a new document not registered in the document management system 20. In this case, the document registration / update system 10 assigns a unique document ID to the scanned image data and registers it in the document management system 20.

  In the above description, a page that matches the image of the representative page of each electronic document is searched from the scanned image data. However, it is not a complete “match”, but the similarity is a threshold value (distinguishable from a threshold value used in processing described later). (Referred to as a “first threshold value”) may search for a page having a representative page or more. In addition, when a plurality of electronic documents having a representative page whose similarity is equal to or higher than the first threshold for the same page in the scanned image data are found, for example, the electronic document having the highest similarity is selected What is necessary is just to determine with the electronic document corresponding to the same page. Alternatively, information on each electronic document having a similarity equal to or higher than the first threshold value may be sent to the multi-function device 30 and a user corresponding to the scanned document may be selected.

  For each scanned document in the scanned image data, the similarity determination system 50 determines the image of each page included in the scanned document and the electronic document corresponding to the scanned document identified by the image search system 40 (“correspondence”). The image of each page in the electronic document) is compared, and the degree of similarity between them is calculated. Then, for each page included in the scanned document, a predetermined threshold value for the image of the page in the corresponding electronic document (referred to as a “second threshold value for distinction from other threshold values). ) Search for pages with similarities. If such a page is found, the found page is determined as a page corresponding to the page in the scanned document. If no such page is found, the page in the scanned document may be determined as a page to be added to the corresponding electronic document.

  It should be noted that conventionally known methods may be used for comparison between images and calculation of similarity in the image search system 40 and the similarity determination system 50.

  Next, an example of the internal configuration of the document registration / update system 10 will be described with reference to FIG. In the example of FIG. 2, the document registration / update system 10 includes a scanned image processing unit 102, a code analysis unit 104, an image search I / F (interface) unit 106, a document management I / F unit 108, a division management table 110, and the like. A determination I / F unit 112 and a similar page management table 114 are provided.

  The scan image processing unit 102 receives scan image data from the multifunction machine 30. The scanned image data may be converted into a predetermined file format such as PDF.

  The code analysis unit 104 detects a code image for document identification such as a QR code (registered trademark) from the image of each page in the scanned image data, and obtains a document ID indicated by the code image. That is, the document registration / update system 10 in this example searches for a corresponding electronic document based on the code image of the document ID included in the page, in addition to searching for the corresponding electronic document using the representative page by the image search system 40. Can do. Which method is used may be set in the document registration / update system 10 by the system administrator or the user. When the method using the code image is selected, the scan image processing unit 102 passes the image of each page in the scan image data to the code analysis unit 104. The code analysis unit 104 searches for the code image from the images of the respective pages by a known method, and if the code image is found, obtains the value of the document ID indicated by the code image by a known method. Then, the obtained document ID is associated with the page where the document ID is found and passed to the document management I / F unit 108.

  On the other hand, when the method for obtaining the corresponding electronic document is selected by the image search system 40, the image of each page of the scan image data acquired by the scan image processing unit 102 is passed to the image search I / F unit 106.

  The image search I / F unit 106 passes the received image of each page to the image search system 40 in the order of pages, for example. The image search system 40 matches the image of the page delivered from the image search I / F unit 106 from among the electronic documents registered in the document management system 20 (or the similarity equal to or higher than the first threshold value). Search for an electronic document with a representative page. If such an electronic document is found, the document ID of the electronic document is returned to the image search I / F unit 106. The image search I / F unit 106 associates the received document ID with the page received from the image search I / F unit 106 and passes it to the document management I / F unit 108.

  The document management I / F unit 108 acquires a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the document ID received from the image search I / F unit 106 or the code analysis unit 104 from the document management system 20, and converts the corresponding electronic document into a scanned document. Update based on. For this update, the division management table 110 and the similar page management table 114 are used. The division management table 110 is a table that stores management information for dividing the scan image data sent from the multifunction machine 30 into scan document units. The similar page management table 114 is a table for managing the relationship between pages having similar images between a scanned document and a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the scanned document. These tables 110 and 114 will be described in detail later.

  The similarity determination I / F unit 112 receives the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document from the document management I / F unit 108, and causes the similarity determination system 50 to calculate the similarity between pages between the two. The calculated similarity information is returned from the similarity determination I / F unit 112 to the document management I / F unit 108. The document management I / F unit 108 registers information in the similar page management table 114 based on the similarity.

  Next, with reference to FIG. 3, an overall processing procedure of the document update processing in the document registration / update system 10 will be described.

  When the user causes the multi-function device 30 to read the original bundle and instruct the transmission to the document registration / update system 10, the scanned image data of the read result is sent to the system 10 via the network 60. In the system 10, the scanned image processing unit 102 receives the scanned image data (S1). The scanned image data is transferred to the image search process (S3) or the identification code detection process (S4) by the image search system 40 by the code analysis unit 104 according to the setting information registered in the document registration / update system 10 (S2). . In these steps S3 and S4, the scanned image data including pages corresponding to a plurality of paper documents is divided into individual documents (scanned documents).

  In step S3, the image search I / F unit 106 executes processing as illustrated in FIG. The procedure in FIG. 4 is an example in which the first page of a document is the representative page of the document. Since the procedure when the last page is set as the representative page can be configured in the same way, the description is omitted.

  In the procedure of FIG. 4, first, images are sequentially extracted from the first page of the received scanned image data (S22), and the images on the pages are passed to the image search system 40 to search for a corresponding electronic document (S23). The image search system 40 compares the received image of the page with the image of the first page (for example, a cover page) of each electronic document registered in the document management system 20, and matches the received page (or the first page). Searches for the first page of the image with a similarity greater than or equal to the threshold. If such a first page is found (the determination result in S24 is Y), the image search system 40 returns the document ID of the electronic document including the first page to the image search I / F unit 106. The electronic document is a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the page extracted in step S22. The image search I / F unit 106 passes a pair of the received document ID and the page number of the page extracted in step S22 (serial number from the first page in the scanned image data) to the document management I / F unit 108. The document management I / F unit 108 holds the document ID (S25) and page number (S26), creates a new entry in the division management table 110, and sets a page number and document ID pair in the new entry. Write (S27).

  An example of the data structure of the division management table 110 is shown in FIG. As illustrated, a pair of a page number in the scanned image data and a document ID of the corresponding electronic document is registered in the division management table 110.

  That is, in this procedure, when a page whose image matches the first page of any electronic document is found from the scanned image data, the page is determined as the first page of each document included in the scanned image data. If the user has set the original bundle to be read by the multifunction machine 30 in the order in which each document included in the bundle is followed by the change page or the additional page after the first page of the document, the document is processed by such a procedure. Detect breaks for each. The information registered in the division management table 110 indicates the separation for each document in the scanned image data and to which electronic document in the document management system 20 each divided document corresponds.

  If an electronic document having the first page corresponding to the image of the page extracted in step S22 is not found (if the determination result in step S24 is N), the image on that page does not correspond to the first page of the document. Steps S25 to S27 are skipped and the process returns to step S21.

  When the process of step S27 is completed, the image search I / F unit 106 determines whether or not all pages of the scanned image data have been checked (S21). (I.e., the first of the unchecked pages) is extracted (S22), and the same check processing (S23 to S27) is repeated. When the check is completed up to the last page of the scanned image data (the determination result in S21 is Y), the procedure in FIG. 4 ends.

  The scanned image data is divided for each document by the above procedure. For example, when the 7-page scanned image data 200 illustrated in FIG. 6 is received, the document registration / update system 10 requests the image search system 40 to search in order from the first page 202. As a result, when the first page 202 matches the first page of the electronic document 212 (document ID = 00001) in the document management system 20, an entry in the first row of the division management table 110 illustrated in FIG. 5 is created. The Next, an electronic document having a first page whose image matches the second page 204 is searched. However, since no such document is found, the information on the second page 204 is not registered in the division management table 110. If such search processing is repeated, the fourth page 206 matches the image of the first page of the electronic document 214 (document ID = 00002) and the sixth page 208 of the electronic document 216 (document ID = 00003). As a result, entries in the second and third rows of the table of FIG. 5 are generated. As a result, the scanned image data 200 is divided into three scanned documents 222, 224 and 226.

  The image search process (S3) has been described above. In the identification code detection process (S4), the same division management table 110 is created based on the code image of each page of the scanned image data. For example, the code analysis unit 104 detects a code image from each page image of the scanned image data, analyzes the code image, and obtains a document ID. The page to be added does not include the code image of the document ID, but is included in the first page of each scanned document. When the code analysis unit 104 obtains a document ID from a certain page in the scanned image data, the document management I / F unit 108 registers the page number and the document ID in the division management table 110. If each page other than the first page of the electronic document also includes a code image of the document ID, it is assumed that the same document ID is detected from another page after detecting the document ID from a page with scan image data. May not be registered in the division management table 110.

  Returning to the description of the procedure in FIG. 3 again, when the division management table 110 is completed by the image search process (S3) or the identification code detection process (S4), the document management I / F unit 108 refers to the table 110. The scanned image data is divided into scanned document units (S5). Then, the document management I / F unit 108 takes out the first scanned document (corresponding to the first entry of the division management table 110) (S7), obtains the document ID of the corresponding electronic document corresponding to this from the division management table 110, The document ID is sent to the document management system 20 to obtain data of the corresponding electronic document (S8). Then, the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document are transferred to the similarity determination I / F unit 112, and a similarity determination process for each page is executed (S9).

  FIG. 7 shows an example of the procedure of this similarity determination process. In this procedure, the similarity determination I / F unit 112 extracts images one page at a time from the second page of the scanned document (S32), the image of the extracted page (referred to as “current page”), and the top of the corresponding electronic document. The image of each page other than the page is passed to the similarity determination system 50 (the first pages are omitted because they are found to match by the image search process). The similarity determination system 50 compares the image of the current page with the image of each page of the target electronic document in order, and calculates the similarity based on the comparison. Then, a page of a corresponding electronic document (referred to as “similar page”) whose similarity is equal to or higher than a second threshold (described above) with respect to the current page is searched (S33). If a similar page with respect to the current page is found (the determination result in S34 is Y), the similarity determination system 50 determines the page number of the similar page in the corresponding electronic document and the corresponding similarity to the similarity determination I / F unit 112. Return to. The similarity determination I / F unit 112 passes the page number of the current page in the scanned document, the page number of the similar page in the corresponding electronic document, and the similarity to the document management I / F unit 108. The document management I / F unit 114 holds these values (S35, 36, 37), creates a new entry in the similar page management table 114, and writes these values in the entry (S38). Then, returning to step S31, it is determined whether or not all pages in the scanned document currently being processed have been checked. If not, the next page is taken out as the current page (S32), and the steps after step S33 are performed. Repeat the process.

  In step S33, when a plurality of pages having a similarity equal to or higher than the second threshold with respect to the current page are found in the corresponding electronic document, for example, the page having the highest similarity among the plurality of pages is set to 1. Alternatively, it may be selected as a similar page. Alternatively, all the numbers and similarities of the plurality of pages may be notified to the similarity determination I / F unit 112, and the document registration / update system 10 may determine the one corresponding to the current page. .

  When the similar page corresponding to the current page is not found (the determination result of S34 is N), the similarity determination I / F unit 112 skips steps S35 to S37 and returns to step S31.

  By repeating the above process for all pages of the scanned document, the similar page management table 114 indicating the similar relationship between the pages of the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document is completed.

  FIG. 8 shows an example of data contents of the similar page management table 114. In this example, the second page in the scanned document and the second page of the corresponding electronic document have a similarity of 95%, and the fifth page in the scanned document and the third page of the corresponding electronic document have a similarity of 100% (that is, the images match). ). In this example, the third and fourth pages in the scanned document are newly added pages.

  Returning to the procedure of FIG. 3, when the similar page management table 114 for the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document is completed by the similarity determination process (S9) described above, the document management I / F unit 108 next displays the table. Referring to 114, the page is changed or added to the corresponding electronic document (S10).

  With reference to FIG. 9, an example of the detailed procedure of step S10 will be described. This procedure uses two variables, cnt and pg. The variables cnt and pg are set to the number of rows in the similar page management table 114 (that is, the number of pages similar to each other between the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document) and the total number of pages of the scanned document at the start of this procedure. Each is initialized (S41, S42). These variables are reduced as the processing described later proceeds. In this procedure, by using such variables, images are changed or added sequentially from the page behind the corresponding electronic document. Details will be described below.

  After the variable initialization, the document management I / F unit 108 determines whether the variable cnt is 0 (S43). If cnt is 0 at this time, it means that there is no similar page between the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document other than the first pages. In this case, it is further determined whether the variable pg is 1 (S44). If the variable pg is 1 at this time, it means that the scanned document only includes the page corresponding to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and does not include any changed or added pages. In this case, the process for the scanned document ends. If the variable pg is not 1 in step S44 (that is, pg is 2 or more), the scanned document includes pages other than the first page. In this case, in this procedure, each page from the second page to the pg page (that is, the last page) in the scanned document is added to the end of the corresponding electronic document (S45).

  An example of the process in step S45 will be described with reference to FIG. In this example, both the scanned document and the corresponding electronic document are two-page documents, and the second page of the scanned document is not similar to the second page of the corresponding electronic document before update (the similarity is the second). Less than the threshold). In this case, the second page of the scanned document is added to the end of the corresponding electronic document. After this update, the corresponding electronic document becomes a three-page document.

  Conversely, in the case of using the procedure of FIG. 10, when the user wants to add a new page to the end of the electronic document, the page of the page to be added is added after the print result of the first page which is the representative page of the electronic document. A paper document may be added and read by the multifunction machine 30.

  If it is determined in step S43 that the variable cnt is not 0, the document management I / F unit 108 acquires the record on the cnt line from the similar page management table 114 (S47). The record acquired in this step is called a target record, and each page indicated by the page number of the corresponding electronic document and the page number of the scanned document in the target record is called a target page.

  Next, it is determined whether or not the similarity in the record of interest is 100% (S48). If it is not 100%, the page of interest of the corresponding electronic document is replaced with the page of interest of the scanned document (S49). That is, in this case, since the target page of the corresponding electronic document and the target page of the scanned document do not completely match, it is determined that the target page of the corresponding electronic document has changed, and Replace with the page of interest. On the other hand, if it is determined in step S48 that the degree of similarity is 100%, there is no change in the page of interest, and step S49 is skipped. In step S48, it is determined whether or not the degree of similarity is 100% in order to determine whether or not the page of interest has changed, but this is only an example. For example, a value close to 100% obtained by experiment or the like may be set as a threshold value, and it may be determined that the page image has been changed if the similarity is equal to or less than the threshold value.

  Next, the document management I / F unit 108 determines whether or not the number of the target page of the scanned document is smaller than the value of the variable pg (which indicates the number of the unprocessed last page of the scanned document) (S50). ). If it is smaller, there is an unprocessed page after the target page of the scanned document. Therefore, the page image of the pg page of the scanned document is added after the target page of the corresponding electronic document (S51). Then, the variable pg is decreased by 1 (S52), and the process returns to step S50. The processing loop of steps S50 to S52 is repeated until the variable pg becomes equal to the number of the target page of the scanned document, that is, until all pages following the target page in the scanned document have been added.

  When the variable pg is equal to the number of the target page of the scanned document, the determination result in step S50 is N. In this case, the document management I / F unit 108 decreases the variables cnt and pg by 1 (S53, S54), and then returns to step S46 to determine whether or not the variable cnt has become zero. That is, when the determination result of S50 becomes N, the processing (page change or addition) related to the attention record acquired from the similar page management table 114 in step S47 is terminated, the variable cnt is decreased by 1, and the next record It shifts to processing.

  If it is determined in step S46 that the variable cnt is not 0, the record indicated by the cnt is acquired from the similar page management table 114 in step S47, and the processes in steps S48 to S54 are repeated. The document management I / F unit 108 repeats the processes of steps S46 to S54 until the variable cnt becomes zero.

  If it is determined in step S46 that the variable cnt has become 0, the document management I / F unit 108 determines whether or not the value of the variable pg at that time is 1 (S55). If the variable pg is not 1, additional pages exist after the first page of the scanned document, so these additional pages (that is, the second to second pg pages of the scanned document) are added after the first page of the corresponding electronic document. (S56), and the process ends. If the variable pg is 1, step S56 is skipped and the process is terminated.

  The example of the detailed procedure of the image change / addition processing (S10 in FIG. 3) has been described above. By this processing, the updated corresponding electronic document is formed in the storage device of the document registration / update system 10. The document management I / F unit 108 updates the corresponding electronic document of the document management system 20 with the updated corresponding electronic document (S11 in FIG. 3). In this update process, for example, the created updated electronic document may be replaced with the corresponding electronic document in the document management system 20. However, the update is not limited to replacement. Instead of replacement, the created updated electronic document may be registered in the document management system 20 as a new version of the original corresponding electronic document. In addition, the created updated electronic document may be simply registered as a new document in the document management system 20 without being associated with the original corresponding electronic document.

  The document management I / F unit 108 repeats the processes of steps S6 to S11 for all the scanned documents that are the result of dividing the scanned image data. When all the scanned documents have been processed, a series of processing ends.

  Next, a specific example of electronic document update according to the procedure of FIG. 9 will be described with reference to FIG. In this example, an electronic document 300 composed of a large number of pages “A, B, C, D,...” Is updated with a six-page paper document “A, B ′, a, i, c, u”. The paper document (showing the scanned document 310 as a result of the reading in the figure) changes the second page of the corresponding electronic document 300 to the page “B ′” and a new page “A” after the second page. ”And“ I ”are added, and a new page“ U ”is added after the original third page“ C ”. When the similarity determination process of FIG. 7 is performed on the scanned document 310, the similar page management table illustrated in FIG. 8 is obtained.

  In this example, in the procedure of FIG. 9, first, variables cnt and pg are initialized to 2 and 6, respectively. In step S47, in accordance with the variable cnt = 2, the record in the second row of the table of FIG. 8 (ie, “5, 3, 100%”) is extracted as the target record, and based on this, the fifth page of the scanned document 300 is displayed. It can be seen that it matches the third page of the corresponding electronic document 300 (the determination result in S48 is Y). Since the page number 5 of the scanned document in the record is smaller than the value 6 of the variable pg at this time (the determination result in S50 is Y), the corresponding electronic document indicated by the target record indicates the sixth page “U” of the scanned document. It is added after page “C” of page number 3 of 300 (S51). A document 302 in FIG. 11 shows the state of the corresponding electronic document at this time. In the next step S52, the variable pg is changed from 6 to 5, and the determination result in step S50 is N.

  Therefore, in steps S53 and S54, the variables cnt and pg are decremented by 1 to become 1 and 4, respectively. This means that the record of interest has moved to the first row of the table of FIG. 9, the fifth and sixth pages in the scanned document 310 have been processed, and the remaining pages have become four pages.

  Next, in step S47, the first line of the table of FIG. 8 is extracted as a record of interest, and based on this, the second page of the scanned document 310 is similar to the second page of the corresponding electronic document 300 (complete match is not performed). (The determination result in S48 is N). Therefore, the second page “B” of the corresponding electronic document 300 is replaced with the second page “B ′” of the scanned document (S49). A document 304 in FIG. 11 shows the state of the corresponding electronic document 300 at this time.

  Since the page number 2 of the scanned document in the record has a value of the variable pg smaller than 5 at this time (the determination result in S50 is Y), the fourth page “I” of the scanned document is designated as the corresponding electronic document 304. Is added to the back of the page number 2 (S51). A document 306 in FIG. 11 shows the state of the corresponding electronic document at this time.

  In the next step S52, the variable pg is decreased from 4 to 3, but the page number 2 of the scanned document indicated by the record of interest is still smaller than the value 3 of pg, so the third page “A” of the scanned document is changed to the corresponding electronic document 306. Is added immediately after the page of page number 2 (S51). The page “A” is added in front of the previously added page “I”. A document 308 in FIG. 11 shows the state of the corresponding electronic document at this time.

  Since the variable pg is decreased from 3 to 2 in the next step S52, the determination result in step S50 is N. In steps S53 and S54, the variables cnt and pg are decreased by 1 to 0 and 1, respectively. Then, the determination result in step S46 becomes Y, and further, the determination result in step S55 becomes Y. Therefore, the series of processes in FIG. 9 ends. Therefore, in the example of FIG. 11, the document 308 is the final update result of the corresponding electronic document 300.

  As described above, in the example described with reference to FIGS. 9 and 11, when adding a page to the electronic document in the document management system 20, the page position of the additional page is determined by the page immediately before the additional page in the electronic document. It is an example in the case of showing. Those skilled in the art will also understand from this example procedure how to indicate the page position of an additional page by the page that immediately follows the additional page.

  The update of the electronic document registered in the document management system 20 has been described above. When a new electronic document is registered in the document management system 20, a new paper document corresponding to the electronic document may be read into the multifunction device 30. In this case, the scanned image data is not divided in step S3 or S4 in the procedure of FIG. 3, and is handled as one scanned document. In step S8, it is found that the electronic document corresponding to the scanned document cannot be found from the document management system 20. In this case, the document registration / update system 10 may add the scanned document to the document management system 20 as a new document.

  Also, a newly registered document may be attached before the document group to be updated. In this case, the page group of the newly registered document is positioned at the top of the scanned image data, and the top page of the existing electronic document to be updated follows. In this case, the document registration / update system 10 newly registers a page group located before the first page of the first document in the division result after dividing the scanned image data in units of documents in step S3 or S4. The document may be determined as a target document and registered in the document management system 20. This is an example in which the first page of the document is the representative page. When the last page of a document is used as a representative page, a new registration target document may be attached after the document group to be updated.

  In this example, a page group attached before or after an already registered document group is newly registered in the document management system 20, but this is only an example. In addition to this, the attached page group can be handled by simply determining that the page is an error and discarding the scanned image of the attached page group, or attaching them to the first document in the registered document group. A method of adding a page is also conceivable. The kind of handling depends on the demands of the site using this system. Therefore, several methods for handling such attached page groups may be installed in the document registration / update system 10, and the administrator of the system 10 may set which of them is used.

  In the above example, the scan image data is divided into document units by dividing the scanned image data by the first (or last) page in each electronic document, but this is only an example. Instead of this, a predetermined separator sheet that separates the documents may be put in a bundle of documents that the user reads into the multifunction device 30. In this case, the document registration / update system 10 stores a separator image, and when a page corresponding to the separator image is found in the scanned image data, the front and the back of the page become separate documents. punctuate. Even when separator sheets are used in this way, an image of a representative page of an electronic document is used to specify a corresponding electronic document for each scanned document.

  The system of the embodiment and each modification exemplified above is realized, for example, by causing a general-purpose computer to execute a program representing the processing of each functional module described above. Here, for example, as shown in FIG. 12, the computer includes a microprocessor such as a CPU 1000, a memory (primary storage) such as a random access memory (RAM) 1002 and a read only memory (ROM) 1004, an HDD ( HDD controller 1008 that controls (hard disk drive) 1006, various I / O (input / output) interfaces 1010, network interface 1012 that performs control for connection to a network such as a local area network, etc. are connected via bus 1014, for example. Circuit configuration. In addition, for example, a disk drive 1016 for reading from and / or writing to a portable disk recording medium such as a CD or a DVD, a portable memory of various standards such as a flash memory via the I / O interface 1010 is connected to the bus 1014. A memory reader / writer 1018 for reading from and / or writing to the nonvolatile recording medium may be connected. A program in which the processing contents of each functional module exemplified above are described is stored in a fixed storage device such as a hard disk drive via a recording medium such as a CD or DVD, or via a communication means such as a network, and stored in a computer. Installed. The program stored in the fixed storage device is read into the RAM 1002 and executed by a microprocessor such as the CPU 1000, whereby the functional module group exemplified above is realized. Some or all of these functional module groups are used as hardware circuits such as dedicated LSI (Large Scale Integration), ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit), or FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array). It may be configured.

  The system configuration shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 is only an example. For example, two or more of the systems 10 to 50 illustrated in FIG. 1 may be mounted on one hardware device. In each of the systems 10 to 50, the components in the system may be mounted on separate hardware devices, and the above-described processing may be realized while communicating with each other via a network.

It is a figure which shows an example of the system configuration | structure of embodiment. It is a figure which shows an example of an internal structure of a document registration / update system. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the whole process sequence of a document registration / update system. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the procedure of an image search process. It is a figure which shows an example of the data content of a division | segmentation management table. It is a figure for demonstrating the specific example of the division | segmentation of the scan image data by an image search process. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the procedure of a similarity determination process. It is a figure which shows an example of the data content of a similar page management table. It is a flowchart which shows an example of the procedure of an image update / addition process. It is a figure which shows the specific example of a page addition. It is a figure which shows the specific example including both the change and addition of a page. It is a figure which shows an example of the hardware constitutions of a computer.

Explanation of symbols

  10 Document registration / update system, 20 Document management system, 30 MFP, 40 Image search system, 50 Similarity determination system.

Claims (5)

A specifying means for specifying a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the original document from electronic documents stored in a storage device based on a read image of each page of the original document read by the original reading device;
Search means for searching for a corresponding image having a degree of similarity equal to or higher than a predetermined threshold with respect to each page of the original document, from among images of each page of the corresponding electronic document;
Means for adding, to the corresponding electronic document in the storage means, a read image in which the corresponding image is not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the original, Adding means for adding the read image to a page position specified by the order relationship between the page and the page where the corresponding image is found;
With
The specifying unit specifies the corresponding electronic document by comparing the image of the first page of the document with the image of the first page of each electronic document stored in the storage device,
The additional means includes
As a result of the search by the search means, a page having the corresponding image as the first page other than the first page of the corresponding electronic document is found in the manuscript, and in the manuscript, immediately before and immediately after the found page. On the other hand, if there is a page for which the corresponding image is not found, the read image of the page for which the corresponding image is not found is displayed as the read image immediately before and after the first page in the corresponding electronic document. Insert it into one of the predetermined,
As a result of the search by the search means, it is found that the first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and the corresponding image is found for all pages other than the first page of the original. If not, the adding means adds the read image of each page other than the first page to the back of the last page of the corresponding electronic document.
An information processing apparatus characterized by that. When a document bundle consisting of a plurality of documents is read by the document reading device, a predetermined separator image or each electronic document stored in the storage device is read out from the read images of each page received from the document reading device. A division unit that searches for an image of the representative page and divides the read image of each page output by the document reading unit by the searched separator image or the image of the representative page into document units;
The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the specifying unit specifies a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the document based on the read image divided by the dividing unit into document units. Of the scanned images of each page of the document, for the scanned image in which the corresponding image is found by the search unit, the similarity between the scanned image and the corresponding image is greater than or equal to the threshold value, and a predetermined first A replacement unit that replaces the corresponding image in the corresponding electronic document in the storage unit with the read image when the threshold value is equal to or less than a threshold value of
The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: An original reading device for reading an original;
A storage device for storing one or more electronic documents including images of one or more pages;
Identifying means for identifying a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the original document from electronic documents stored in the storage device based on a read image of each page of the original document read by the original reading device;
Search means for searching for a corresponding image having a degree of similarity equal to or higher than a predetermined threshold with respect to each page of the original document, from among images of each page of the corresponding electronic document;
Means for adding, to the corresponding electronic document in the storage means, a read image in which the corresponding image is not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the original, Adding means for adding the read image to a page position specified by the order relationship between the page and the page where the corresponding image is found;
An information processing apparatus having
Including
The specifying unit specifies the corresponding electronic document by comparing the image of the first page of the document with the image of the first page of each electronic document stored in the storage device,
The additional means includes
As a result of the search by the search means, a page having the corresponding image as the first page other than the first page of the corresponding electronic document is found in the manuscript, and in the manuscript, immediately before and immediately after the found page. On the other hand, if there is a page for which the corresponding image is not found, the read image of the page for which the corresponding image is not found is displayed as the read image immediately before and after the first page in the corresponding electronic document. Insert it into one of the predetermined,
As a result of the search by the search means, it is found that the first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and the corresponding image is found for all pages other than the first page of the original. If not, the adding means adds the read image of each page other than the first page to the back of the last page of the corresponding electronic document.
An information processing system characterized by this. Computer
Identification means for identifying a corresponding electronic document corresponding to the original document from electronic documents stored in the storage device, based on a read image of each page of the original document read by the original reading device;
Search means for searching for a corresponding image having a similarity equal to or higher than a predetermined threshold for each page of the original document from images of each page of the corresponding electronic document;
Means for adding, to the corresponding electronic document in the storage means, a read image in which the corresponding image is not found by the search means among the read images of each page of the original, Adding means for adding the read image to a page position specified by the order relationship between the page and the page where the corresponding image is found;
A program for functioning as,
The specifying unit specifies the corresponding electronic document by comparing the image of the first page of the document with the image of the first page of each electronic document stored in the storage device,
The additional means includes
As a result of the search by the search means, a page having the corresponding image as the first page other than the first page of the corresponding electronic document is found in the manuscript, and in the manuscript, immediately before and immediately after the found page. On the other hand, if there is a page for which the corresponding image is not found, the read image of the page for which the corresponding image is not found is displayed as the read image immediately before and after the first page in the corresponding electronic document. Insert it into one of the predetermined,
As a result of the search by the search means, it is found that the first page of the read original corresponds to the first page of the corresponding electronic document, and the corresponding image is found for all pages other than the first page of the original. If not, the adding means adds the read image of each page other than the first page to the back of the last page of the corresponding electronic document.
A program characterized by that.

Images