Faxempfang und OCR

[abraxas_bEi_hamburg.snafu.de (Michael Lang)]

das DOS Programm Ecofax kann in der neuen Version 2.1 auch empfangen.
Allerdings gibt's, wie so oft Probleme beim Texterkennen des Faxes mit
Open Book. Zu diesem Thema hat der Autor von Ecofax nun etwas
zusammengestellt. Ich haenge seine Nachricht dazu an diesen Text.
Bekommen habe ich diese Nachricht ueber die Ecofax Info Mailing Liste.
In die wurde ich automatisch eingetragen, da ich registrierter
Benutzer bin. Ich bin mit Ecofax zufrieden. Die neue Version wurde mir
ohne Aufforderung per Email geschickt (nicht die Shareware, sondern
eine registrierte). Auch auf meine Fragen bekomme ich prompt Antwort.
 
          <***  ml  ***>
 
InfoDesk Tect Bulletin #1:
 
Using PCX files generated by Ecofax with Arkenstone's OpenBook (tm)


=================================================================1. Description of the problem
   --------------------------
The OpenBook (OB) OCR system from Arkenstone allows you to import and
process PCX files. Unfortunately the PCX files generated by the
utility EFX2PCX distributed with Ecofax do not seem to be compatible
with the PCX types supported by OB. This is probably due to the fact
that EFX2PCX generates plain monochromatic PCX files (with 1 bit planes),
while OB seems to accept only PCX images with at least a color depth of
8 bits (256 colors or gray levels).
If you try to open an Ecofax PCX file with OB, your PC will either
hang or you will get an error message, depending on the OB version.
 
2. A possible solution: The CONVFAX.ZIP package
   --------------------------------------------
One way to try to solve the PCX problem is to use a conversion
utility to increase the color depth of the PCX files.
To accomplish that in DOS you can use DISPLAY, which is a very powerful
DOS image manipulation program. I have put together a special package
called "convfax.zip" that automates this task for Ecofax and OB users.
The distribution package can be found on Eurisco's FTP server,
ftp.eurisco.com, in the /pub/utils directory. You can also request it as a
MIME attachment, if you do not have access to FTP. Please note that the
package is quite big: about 620KB.
 
3. How to install and use CONVFAX.ZIP
   ----------------------------------
a) Download "convfax.zip" from Eurisco's FTP server and copy it into your
   Ecofax directory (For simplicity's sake I will assume here it is
   C:ECOFAX).
b) Decompress it with PKUNZIP. Very important: Use the "-d" command-line
   switch to recreate the necessary subdirectories. If you do not do that,
   CONVFAX.BAT will most probably fail to work!
c) Edit CONVFAX.BAT and modify the two "set inbox" and "set obimport"
   variables to reflect your actual configuration. Please note that you
   should NOT set these to variables to the same directory, since that
   will cause unpredictable results.
Once you have edited CONVFAX.BAT, you are ready to test it: Simply
launch it from the Ecofax main directory and then enter OB to have it
process the converted PCX files.
 
4. An important note concerning fax OCR
   ------------------------------------
As stated in the OB documentation, to obtain acceptable results with
the recognition of a fax document imported in OB, the document itself
should have been faxed with a resolution of 200x200 dots per inch,
which is usually identified as "Fine Resolution" on most fax machines.
While receiving faxes Ecofax will automatically switch to that resolution
if the sending part is using it, so that the resulting EFX will be saved
in the high resolution mode. In any case, neither Ecofax nor OB can do
anything to improve the quality of a bad fax.
 
Cleto Pescia
Eurisco Information Systems
info_bEi_eurisco.com