JPH0460759A - Document preparation support device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the efficiency of document preparation by providing a layout analysis part, a layout preparation instruction part giving the instruction of setting an area similar to a document becoming a model in a document to be prepared based on obtained layout information. CONSTITUTION:A picture input part 2 inputs an original picture becoming the model and analyzes a binarized document picture in an area analysis part. A character part analysis part analyzes the internal structure of the area extracted as a character area in the area analysis part. In a graphic part analysis part, the area judged to be a graphic in the area analysis part is analyzed and a linear graphic is made into vector. Thus, the analysis of a layout terminates and the original picture which the picture input part 2 reads is separated into respective areas of the character area, a picture area and a graphic area. The layout preparation instruction part 4 gives the instruction of layout to a layout allocation part 5 and allocates respective areas.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Field of Industrial Application] This invention relates to document creation devices such as word processors and workstations, and in particular, the present invention relates to document creation devices such as word processors and workstations. The present invention relates to a document creation support device for manually creating documents.

[Conventional technology]

When creating a document using a document creation device such as a word processor or workstation, in addition to characters, a single document may include vector display figures defined by vector information such as straight lines and curves, or images read in image leagues. There are cases where it is desired to mix bitmap images defined by bit patterns, such as images with bitmap images. When creating a document containing a mixture of characters, vector display figures, bitmap images, etc., the data processing format within the apparatus is different for each of the characters, vector display figures, and pitmap images. Therefore, in order to improve processing efficiency, special areas called character frames, figure frames, and image frames are set in each document, and when creating or editing a document, the attributes of the areas targeted for processing are determined. Processing is performed according to its attributes.

In this specification, the term "image" in a broad sense includes characters, vector display figures, pit map images, etc., and in a narrow sense refers only to pit map images.

When creating a document containing a mixture of text, vector display figures, pit map images, etc., the document creator must consider the layout, set a frame for the relevant attributes within the document, and adjust the size and position. It was necessary to do this.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

However, this setting and adjustment of frames must be performed for each character frame, graphic frame, and image frame, and the same operations must be repeated even when there are multiple frames with the same attribute. For this reason, there was a problem in that document creation work was complicated and time-consuming. In particular, even if a similar document already exists and the author wants to use a similar layout, the author has to input everything one by one, which is not only labor-intensive but also mentally painful.

One possible way to improve this is to create a variety of documents with basic layouts in advance, then search for, copy, and input the contents as needed.

However, with this method, it is necessary to register the necessary layout in advance, and the initial input work is very labor-intensive. Furthermore, all documents with required layouts must be registered, which requires a huge amount of storage capacity. When using these registered layouts, it is necessary to search for the desired layout, but there are problems such as difficulty in searching if a large number of layouts are registered.

The present invention solves the above problems, and
If there is a layout document similar to the one you want to create, the system automatically generates layouts of various frames on the spot to improve the efficiency of document creation.

[Means to solve the problem]

In order to achieve the above-mentioned purpose, this document creation support device sets different areas according to the attributes of images included in the document to be created when creating a document, and sets different areas for each area. A document creation support bag used in a document creation device that performs processing includes an image input section that inputs a template document as an image, and an image input section that determines the attributes of the image of the input document and detects differences in these attributes. a layout analysis unit that extracts layout information indicating the size, position, and attributes of each area based on the layout information, and an instruction to set an area similar to a document that will be an addition template in a document to be created based on the obtained layout information. The present invention is characterized by comprising a layout generation instruction section that performs the following steps.

The layout analysis section extracts character area 1 from the document image.
a region analysis unit that extracts a graphic area and an image area; a character part analysis unit that analyzes the attributes of a character part in the character area; and a character part analysis part that analyzes the graphic part in the graphic area to extract line components in the figure. It can be composed of a graphic part analysis section that outputs vector data.

[Effect]

In the present invention, when setting the layout of a document, an image of the document serving as a template is input, and the type of the area is identified by the layout analysis section. For example, a circumscribed rectangle of a connected image included in a document is obtained, and a character area, a graphic area, and an image area are determined based on the size, arrangement, etc. of this circumscribed rectangle. Based on these analyzed areas, corresponding areas are set for the newly created document according to instructions from the layout generation instruction section. Therefore, in a newly created document, each area will be set in the same layout as the template document.

〔Example〕

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Hereinafter, features of the present invention will be specifically described based on examples with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of a document creation device such as a word processor to which the document creation support device of the present invention is applied. The document creation support device 1 includes an image input unit 2 that inputs a document as an image;
A layout analysis unit 3 extracts a document layout from an input document image, and a graphic frame 2 character frame according to the analyzed layout.

It includes a layout generation instruction section 4 that instructs generation of image frames and the like. The layout specified by the layout generation instruction unit 4 is expressed by the layout allocation unit 5 in a form that is actually visible to the user.

In addition, data input from the keyboard/mouse 6 is
The text is converted into characters and graphics by the character/graphic input unit 7 and inputted, and the content allocation is inputted into each of the previously laid out blocks in the unit 8 and displayed on the display B9.

Further, when a layout is manually input from the keyboard/mouse 6, the data input from the keyboard/mouse 6 is converted in the layout coordinate/attribute input section 10 and sent to the layout generation instruction section 4.

FIG. 2 shows the configuration of the layout analysis section 3. The document image input from the image input section 2 is divided into regions of characters, vector display figures, and bitmap images by the region analysis section 11. Data (character frame/character part attribute data) such as the size of the text, the spacing between character strings, and the direction of character strings are extracted.

In the graphic area, the graphic part analysis unit 13 detects vertical and horizontal lines such as the frame of the enclosing frame 9 of the figure, the horizontal lines, the column partition lines, etc., and outputs them as vector data (graphic frame/cross line data). Further, the image portion is output as frame data.

Next, the operation of the above-mentioned layout analysis section 3 will be explained.

First, a document image serving as a template is input to the image input unit 2 (see FIG. 1), and the binarized document image is analyzed by the area analysis unit 11. The area analysis method is not particularly limited, but one method is to take circumscribed rectangles surrounding each connected image and classify them based on the size, arrangement, etc. of the circumscribed rectangles.

FIG. 3 shows an example of the procedure for area analysis.

First, a circumscribed rectangle is extracted (step 101). At this time, the overlapping circumscribed rectangles are replaced with a circumscribed rectangle that encompasses the entire area and integrated (step 102).

A circumscribed rectangle whose vertical or horizontal length exceeds the character size can be identified as a bitmap image or a vector display figure (step 103). For example, if you are dealing with characters up to 36 points, the height or width is approximately 13
Anything larger than mm is regarded as a bitmap image or vector display figure. Furthermore, among large circumscribed rectangles, those with an aspect ratio close to 1 and a high ratio of black pixels within the circumscribed rectangle can be identified as image areas (step 104). Note that the aspect ratio close to 1 means that the aspect ratio is in the range of 1/3 to 3.

Other large circumscribed rectangles can be considered graphic areas.

The small circumscribed rectangle is determined to be a character, but this can be confirmed by further examining the periodicity of the character in the horizontal and vertical directions (step 105).

A set of circumscribed rectangles with substantially constant horizontal and vertical character periods obtained at this time is extracted as a character group having the same attribute, that is, a character area (step 106). Through the above processing, character areas, graphic areas, and image areas are extracted.
Size and position information of each area can be obtained.

In the area analysis described above, the size of the circumscribed rectangle.

Although each area was identified based on the aspect ratio, etc., there are also other examples, such as Kida et al., "Configuration Method of Automatic Document Recognition System," 1 Journal of the Institute of Image Electronics Engineers, Vol. 15, No. 2 (1986), P2O3-115.
It is possible to employ an algorithm that uses a combination of the marginal distribution method and the black connection method, as described in .

Next, the character part analysis section 12 will be explained. Here,
The area analysis unit 11 analyzes the internal structure of the area extracted as a character area. Here, too, the method is not particularly limited.

One method uses the previously extracted circumscribed rectangle and its period. An example of a schematic procedure is shown in FIG.

First, detect the direction of the string. Character spacing is usually narrower than string spacing. Therefore, the intervals between the rectangles are extracted (step 201), and it is determined whether the direction in which the average interval between the circumscribed rectangles in the horizontal and vertical directions is smaller is the direction in which the character strings are lined up (step 202).

That is, when the vertical spacing is greater than the horizontal spacing,
If horizontal writing is determined, the character string spacing is set to the vertical period (step 203); otherwise, vertical writing is determined and the character string spacing is set to the horizontal period (step 204).

Next, the character size is determined from the maximum values of the width and height of the circumscribed rectangle within the area (step 205).

This allows the attributes within each character area to be specified.

Next, the graphic part analysis unit 13 analyzes the area determined to be a graphic by the region analysis unit 11, and vectorizes the line figure. It is also possible to vectorize all detected line shapes, but here we focus on structurally important and reusable information such as frame information, ruled lines, table frames made of vertical and horizontal straight lines, and column partition lines. Extract only long vertical and horizontal line segments that are considered to be of high use value.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the analysis procedure.

The method for extracting vertical and horizontal lines is to trace black pixels horizontally and vertically, leaving only those with a predetermined length or more (steps 301 and 302). Thereafter, the obtained vertical and horizontal lines are converted into vector information indicated by starting point and ending point information, thickness, etc. (step 303). Of this vectorized line, −
A line segment of a book that exists alone is regarded as a ruled line or a column partition line (step 304). Furthermore, a part made up of a combination of horizontal and vertical lines is regarded as a table part (step 305), and a part made up of horizontal and vertical lines is regarded as a frame of a figure (step 306). ).

In addition, anything other than this is considered to be a -film surface type.

With the above steps, the layout analysis is completed and the image input section 2
The image of the document read in is separated into character areas, image areas, and graphic areas. Note that the graphic area also includes tables and lines. Further, in the character area, attributes such as internal character size, character string spacing, and character string direction are also added.

Based on this information, the layout generation instruction section 4 shown in FIG. 1 instructs the layout allocation section 5 to perform layout and allocation of each area.

For example, when a document serving as a template containing a character part a, a bitmap image part, a graphic part C9, a partition line d1, a table e, etc. as shown in FIG. 6(a) is read by the image input part 2,
When layout analysis is performed on this image, results as schematically shown in the same figure are obtained. In the same figure (b), A is a character area, B is an image area, C is a graphic area, D is a partition line, and E is a back structure. Display section 9 where documents are displayed
Each area is displayed on the screen based on the layout analysis, so the document creator uses the keyboard/mouse 6 to specify the area in which characters or figures are to be input, and uses the keyboard/mouse 6 to enter each area. A document with the desired layout can be generated simply by inputting the desired content into the area.

Note that when a bitmap image is directly embedded in a document, the image data input from the image input section 2 may be sent to the content allocation section 6 and then synthesized.

Alternatively, the document creator may edit each region generated by layout analysis to a desired layout, and then input the contents.

In the above-described embodiments, document creation was explained as an example, but the present invention can be applied not only to document creation, but also to the creation of predetermined formats such as slips.

In addition, in this embodiment, only the vertical and horizontal lines are reproduced for the front part based on the vector data obtained by analysis, but if it is possible to generate and manage the back structure on the document creation device side, Rather than outputting vector data directly,
It is also possible to output information indicating attributes of the table, such as how many rows and columns the table has.

In addition, in the above example, the information extracted in the character part was only the character size, 9 character string spacing, vertical writing and horizontal writing, but there are also differences in fonts, language differences, for example, differences between Japanese and English. These attributes may be added by identifying the

Furthermore, by performing character recognition in the character portion and performing graphic recognition in the graphic portion, not only the layout information but also the content itself can be reused.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, in the present invention, the layout is automatically generated based on the image of the read document, so when creating a document with a similar layout, the document creator can The work of setting and modifying each area becomes unnecessary or easy, and the efficiency of document creation is improved. Further, since there is no need to create or register a standard layout document in advance, there is no need for any preliminary steps in the preparation stage, and there is no need for a large-capacity storage device.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a document creation device to which the document creation support device of the present invention is applied, FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a layout analysis section, and FIG. 3 is an example of the procedure for area analysis. Figure 4 is a flowchart showing an example of the procedure for analyzing the literature section, Figure 5 is a flowchart showing an example of the procedure for analyzing the graphic section, and Figures 6 (a) and (b) are the results of manuscript image and layout analysis. It is an explanatory view showing an example typically. 1; 3: 4: 5: 6 near; 9: 10: 11; 13: Document creation support device! 2: Image input section Layout analysis section Layout generation instruction section Layout allocation section Keyboard/Mouse Character/Graphic input section 8: Content allocation section Display section Layout coordinate/attribute input section Area analysis section 12: Character section Analysis section Graphics Department analysis department

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Used in a document creation device that sets different areas depending on the attributes of an image included in the document to be created and performs different processing on each area when creating a document. This document creation support device includes an image input unit that inputs a template document as an image, and determines the attributes of the image of the input document, and determines the size and position of each area based on the difference in attributes. and a layout analysis unit that extracts layout information indicating attributes, and a layout generation instruction unit that instructs setting of areas similar to the template document in a document to be created based on the obtained layout information. A document creation support device characterized by: 2. The layout analysis unit includes an area analysis unit that extracts a text area, a graphic area, and an image area from an image of a document, and a text part analysis unit that analyzes attributes of a text part in the text area.
2. The document creation support device according to claim 1, further comprising a graphic part analysis section that analyzes a graphic part in the graphic area, extracts line components in the graphic, and outputs the extracted line components as vector data.