JPH113400A - Character recognizing device, character recognizing method and recording medium recording character recognizing program - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a character recognizing device, a character recognizing method and a recording medium recording character recognizing program with which work for performing character recognition to image data and for converting them to character data can be easily performed when the relevant image data are stored in a clip board storage means. SOLUTION: It is monitored by a clip board monitoring part 101 whether data contents in a clip board storage area 15 are updated or not and when data contents in the clip board storage area 15 are updated, it is judged by a data discriminating part 102 whether data contents are image data or not. When they are image data, the characters of the relevant image data are recognized by a character recognizing part 100, and data in the clip board storage area 15 are reloaded with the character recognized results by a control part 103.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a character recognition device and a character recognition method for performing character recognition on image data, and a recording medium on which a character recognition program is recorded.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art With the development of personal computers and operating systems and the development of an environment in which a plurality of processing programs can operate simultaneously, image data used in other processing programs is input to a character recognition device. It has become possible.

[0003] The operating system has a function called a clipboard, which allows a plurality of application programs to share a memory area and read and write each other.

For example, after image data captured using utility software for reading an image from an image scanner is stored in a clipboard, the image data stored in the clipboard is pasted into an image storage area of a character recognition program to perform character recognition. Now you can do it. As a result, it is not necessary to pay attention to the difference in the image format between the utility software and the character recognition program, and the convenience is improved.

[0005]

In such a character recognizing apparatus, when it is desired to perform a character recognizing process on certain image data stored on a clipboard, the character recognizing apparatus is started and then the image data is read. After that, a large number of operations are required by the operator until a character recognition result is obtained, which has a problem in operability.

The present invention provides a character recognizing device, a character recognizing method, and a character recognizing method that, when image data is stored in a clipboard storage means, performs character recognition on the image data and easily converts the image data into character data. It is an object to provide a recording medium on which a recognition program is recorded.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to solve this problem, the present invention provides a clipboard storage means for temporarily storing data, and a monitoring means for monitoring whether the data content of the clipboard storage means has been updated. In response to the updating of the data content of the clipboard storage means by the monitoring means, the determination means for determining whether the data content of the clipboard storage means is image data, and the determination means determines that the data content is image data. At this time, the image processing apparatus includes a character recognizing unit that performs character recognition of the image data and a rewriting unit that rewrites the data content of the clipboard storage unit to a result of character recognition by the character recognizing unit.

As a result, when the image data is stored in the clipboard storage means, a character recognizing apparatus which can easily perform a character recognition on the image data and convert the image data into character data can be obtained.

[0009]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS According to the first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a clipboard storage means for temporarily storing data, a monitoring means for monitoring whether or not the data content of the clipboard storage means has been updated. When the monitoring unit updates the data content of the clipboard storage unit, the determination unit determines whether the data content of the clipboard storage unit is image data, and when the determination unit determines that the data content is image data. A character recognizing unit that performs character recognition of the image data, and a rewriting unit that rewrites the data content of the clipboard storing unit to a result of character recognition by the character recognizing unit. Characters can be automatically recognized and converted into character data.

[0010]

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

FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram of a character recognition device according to an embodiment of the present invention, and shows a hardware configuration of the character recognition device.

In FIG. 1, reference numeral 10 denotes a central processing unit (CPU) for controlling the apparatus. Reference numeral 11 denotes a cathode ray tube (CRT) for displaying the progress and results of processing by the CPU 10, and constitutes a display device of the present invention. 12
Denotes a mouse, and 13 denotes a keyboard, which constitute the input device of the present invention.

14 is a random access memory (RA)
M), and the RAM 14 has a clipboard storage area 15 for temporarily storing image data, character data, and the like, and an image storage area 16 for storing image data for character recognition.

Reference numeral 18 denotes a hard disk. The hard disk 18 has a program storage area 19 for storing a character recognition program according to a flowchart shown in FIG. 3, which will be described later, a character recognition dictionary storage area 20, which is referred to during the character recognition processing.
OS storage area 21 for storing an operating system
Having.

Reference numeral 22 denotes a read only memory (ROM)
The ROM 22 has a boot program storage area 23.

The processing contents of the character recognition device of the present embodiment are stored in the program storage area 19, which operates on the operating system in the OS storage area 21. Further, in order for this operating system to operate, a boot program in the boot program storage area 23 is required.

FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram of the character recognition device according to one embodiment of the present invention, and shows the configuration of the character recognition device by the functional means.

In FIG. 2, reference numeral 100 denotes a character recognition unit;
1 is a clipboard monitoring unit, 102 is a data judgment unit, 1
Reference numeral 03 denotes a control unit, which stores a processing program stored in the program storage area
This is realized by the execution of the PU 10.

The operation of the character recognition device configured as described above will be described below. FIG. 3 is an operation flowchart of the character recognition device according to the embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 2 shows a state in which a PU 10 executes a character recognition program stored in a program storage area of a hard disk 18.

The character recognition program according to the present embodiment is assumed to correspond only to monochrome binary image data.
When data is stored in the clipboard storage area 15 by application software, the type of the data is also stored in addition to the content of the data. Examples of data types include text data and image data (monochrome binary or multi-level).

In FIG. 3, in step 1, when the character recognition program stored in the program storage area 19 of the hard disk 18 is started, it is first determined whether or not the character recognition processing is to be terminated. If the user wants to end, the process ends.

In step 2, the clipboard monitoring unit 1
01, it is determined whether the data stored in the clipboard storage area 15 has been updated. If the data has been updated, go to step 3. If the data has not been updated, the process returns to step 1.

In step 3, the data determination unit 102 refers to the clipboard storage area 15 and determines whether the data in this area is monochrome binary image data supported by the character recognition program. If monochrome binary image data is stored, step 4
Go to step 1, if it is other data, return to step 1.

In step 4, the control section 103 copies the image data in the clipboard storage area 15 to the image storage area 16 for character recognition.

In step 5, character recognition is performed on the image data stored in the image storage area 16. Character recognition is a known technique for converting image data into character data, and the present invention does not matter about the method. Therefore,
Here is a brief explanation.

In character recognition, layout information is analyzed and divided into a character area, a table area, a graphic area, and the like, and the character area is divided into a vertical writing area and a horizontal writing area. In the case of a vertical writing area, for example, as in a newspaper, the reading order of each rectangle is determined from the upper right area to the lower left area, and the character recognition dictionary is stored using the dictionary stored in the character recognition dictionary storage area 20. Character recognition may be performed using the dictionary stored in the storage area 20 to obtain a character string output in this order.
In the case of a horizontal writing area, reading is performed from the upper left area to the lower right area.

In step 6, the result of the character recognition performed in step 5 is overwritten in the clipboard storage area 15 by the control unit 103, thereby rewriting the data in the clipboard storage area 15 into character data.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, the clipboard storage area 15 is periodically monitored, and when image data corresponding to the character recognition program is stored in the clipboard storage area 15, this is detected. Automatically recognizes the character, and stores the result in the clipboard storage area 1.
By overwriting the character string with No. 5, it is possible to realize extremely excellent operability that character data as a character recognition result can be obtained with a smaller number of operations than in the past.

[0029]

As described above, according to the present invention, the clipboard storage means for temporarily storing data, the monitoring means for monitoring whether the data content of the clipboard storage means has been updated, and the clipboard by the monitoring means A determination unit that determines whether the data content of the clipboard storage unit is image data in response to the update of the data content of the storage unit, and, when the determination unit determines that the data content is image data, Character recognizing means for recognizing the character, and rewriting means for rewriting the data content of the clipboard storing means to the result of character recognition by the character recognizing means, so that the image data stored in the clipboard storing means As it can automatically recognize characters and convert them to character data,
Very good operability can be realized.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram of a character recognition device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram of a character recognition device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is an operation flowchart of the character recognition device in one embodiment of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 Reference Signs List 10 Central processing unit (CPU) 11 Cathode ray tube (CRT) 12 Mouse 13 Keyboard 14 Random access memory (RAM) 15 Clipboard storage area 16 Image storage area 18 Hard disk 19 Program storage area 20 Character recognition dictionary storage area Reference Signs List 21 OS storage area 22 Read-only memory (ROM) 23 Start-up program storage area 100 Character recognition unit 101 Clipboard monitoring unit 102 Data determination unit 103 Control unit

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. Clipboard storage means for temporarily storing data; monitoring means for monitoring whether data content of the clipboard storage means has been updated; and data content of the clipboard storage means being updated by the monitoring means. In response to the determination, the determination unit determines whether the data content of the clipboard storage unit is image data. When the determination unit determines that the data content is image data, character recognition of the image data is performed. A character recognizing device comprising: a character recognizing unit; and a rewriting unit for rewriting data content of the clipboard storage unit to a result of character recognition by the character recognizing unit. 2. A character recognition method for performing character recognition on image data stored in a clipboard storage area, which monitors whether data contents in the clipboard storage area have been updated and updates the data contents. It is determined whether the updated data content is image data.If the data is image data, character recognition is performed on the image data, and the data content of the clipboard storage area is rewritten with the result of character recognition. A character recognition method characterized by controlling. 3. A recording medium on which a character recognition program for performing character recognition on image data stored in a clipboard storage area is recorded, wherein whether the data content of the clipboard storage area has been updated is monitored. When the content is updated, it is determined whether or not the updated data content is image data. If the data is image data, character recognition is performed on the image data, and the data content of the clipboard storage area is subjected to character recognition. A recording medium having recorded thereon a character recognition program characterized by being controlled so as to be rewritten.