Intelligent Document Scanning

The ImageTrac® Scanning Platform

The imaging industry has evolved in an effort to help organizations deal with their growing volume of documents. Imaging Business Machines manufactures and markets the ImageTrac Scanning Platform, a suite of hardware, software and professional services which revolutionized document scanning. The platform addresses real-world business processing requirements up front in the scan process. This breakthrough approach fills the technological gap previously addressed by third-party products such as TWAIN, ISIS and Kofax. The result is Intelligent Scanning. This document will explain Intelligent Scanning and how it is achieved with the ImageTrac Scanning Platform.

BACKGROUND
The industry evolution began with the introduction of microfilm and microfiche by many of today's large digital imaging companies such as Kodak, Bell and Howell and Fujitsu. Most of these companies built early archiving devices called microfilmers. Microfilm readers allowed a person to view microfilm, a picture of a document in a very compact footprint, on a light box. As an "archive" function, microfilm typically occurred at the very end of a document's life cycle in an organization. Therefore, the importance was placed on the picture and not on the transport of the document through the microfilmer.

The next revolutionary change was the introduction of digital document capture. The development of the Charged Coupled Device (CCD) ushered in the digital picture taking age. A CCD is a solid-state device that measures light and converts it to digital signals (typically via an analog to digital processor). This capture was an extension and replacement for the picturetaking of the microfilmer. Digital documents were now on their way to becoming a standard replacement for film.

THE EVOLUTION OF INTELLIGENT DOCUMENT SCANNING
The focus over the past twenty years has been on improving picture quality (bitonal, gray-scale and now color). Almost all of today's production scanners have evolved from the microfilmer. These devices focus on taking a picture, rather than the business rules by which the picture and its data elements need to be processed. The driving force behind the ImageTrac Scanning Platform involves processing the document first and taking its picture second - Intelligent Document Scanning.

As mentioned above, traditional scanning has focused largely on getting a picture of a document. The problem with this is that the information on this piece of paper, or the relationship between multiple pieces of paper, is the key to driving downstream processes of a business (accounts payable, claims, accounts receivable, human resources, order fulfillment, etc.). The picture merely provides a visual representation of this information.

In today's digital world, the emphasis is on capturing more meaningful data from a document earlier in the process in order to quickly feed richer, more useful content to subsystems.

PROCESSING BEYOND DIGITAL CAPTURE
Once an image has been taken, the physical processing of that document may not be over. For example, in a wholesale lockbox environment, checks must be batched, endorsed, encoded, sorted and exchanged with other financial institutions. In an airline revenue accounting environment, passenger tickets must be sorted and exchanged between airlines for inter-airline processing. All of this points to the need for an "Intelligent Document Processor" capable of combining multiple steps to feed downstream processes.

Intelligent Document Scanning accommodates demanding business rules and input options as part of the scanning process. Documents need to be imprinted, recognized, sorted and digitized on an application-by-application basis. Documents processed for accounts receivable have different needs from documents processed by the claims department. The market's approach to meeting these needs typically involves a document scanner for each individual application paired with third-party hardware or API solutions such as TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS. While such solutions sound reasonable, they actually reduce the efficiency of scanning by moving the intelligence to a post-scan process. The scanner is nothing more than a glorified microfilmer! Intelligent Scanning produces quality data (meta and image) for downstream processes while considering, and acting upon, post-scan paper handling requirements. The ImageTrac Scanning Platform accomplishes Intelligent Scanning.

THE DEFICIENCIES OF THIRD-PARTY SOLUTIONS
A number of deficiencies lie in the various third-party solutions (TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS). First, they try to make all scanners look and act alike. The next problem is that these tools are not capable of incorporating real business processing rules in their approach. Developing a workable solution to integrate the scanner with third party device drivers requires considerable programming, and most importantly, time and risk. The biggest deficiency is when a new business requirement falls outside the setup of the current system. A new solution or significant modification is required - typically more scanners, new drivers and more programming!

THE IMAGETRAC SOLUTION
At the core of Imaging Business Machines' solution is the ImageTrac Scanning Platform. The ImageTrac scanner provides intelligent feeding, document tracking, skew analysis, barcode recognition, sophisticated printing, OCR recognition, MICR recognition, multi-image output, color sense and sortation. The SoftTrac scanning application enables business rules to be applied to all of the scanner's functions, without any programming, on an application-by-application basis.

Feeding - Intelligent feeding provides a means to feed different sizes and weights of paper on an application-by-application basis. One application may contain intermixed documents that require more "gap" or spacing between the documents. Another application may involve high quality "slick" paper that requires more aggressive de-doubling. Another application may involve heavy stock paper that needs to be pushed into the feeder faster. One of the most complex handling requirements involves processing envelopes intermixed with documents, without track stoppages or manual handling. The ImageTrac allows each application, or job, to have its own profile with specific motor settings for each document profile and mix. With TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS the options are limited to START FEED and STOP FEED. The ImageTrac enables you to feed faster, feed slower, gap documents more, gap them less, de-double more aggressively and adjust doubles detection on an application-by-application basis.

Document Tracking/Throughput - The single most important function of an intelligent scanner. Most scanners feed a sheet of paper, capture an image and then start the cycle over. The ImageTrac, depending on the number of pockets, can have 1 - 30 pieces of paper in the transport at one time. Each piece of paper is tracked as it moves through the different stations such as feed, registration, barcode, printing and pocketing. If a piece of paper stops in the scanner, it is the responsibility of the tracking software to identify the location of the document and alert the operator to allow for reprocessing of the questionable item without impacting the other pieces of paper in the system. This dramatically impacts the scanner's "wall clock" throughput. "Wall clock" means that there is a finite amount of time to process work; therefore, it is incumbent on the scanner to make the most of this available scanning time. Scanners rarely achieve 50% of the rated speed promoted by their manufacturers. The ImageTrac scanning platform easily achieves better than 80% of its rated speed with most applications.

A large part of this throughput effectiveness comes from the extensive document tracking and recovery features of the ImageTrac. With TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS solutions, you get an error message indicating the scanner has stopped. It is the operator's responsibility to find the piece of paper and clear the item. With the SoftTrac scanner application, the questionable document is automatically located, the operator is instructed which documents need to be re-fed or pocketed, the inkjet printer is turned off if paper is already printed and so on. There is nothing left open to chance or interpretation.

Business Rules Upfront - Barcode recognition is essential for auto-batch processing, transaction processing, form recognition and 2D barcode data capture. With TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS, the recognition is post-scan. However, sorting, inkjet printing, applying business rules and running batches (rather than transactions) can only be done effectively while the document is being processed - not post-scan. Many business processes typically require the handling and processing of documents and envelopes. The solution is not physically separate workflows. These envelopes contain a variety of items (correspondence, return forms, photographs, payments, order forms, claims, etc.) Many of these pieces of paper may contain barcodes. Some operations insert barcode separators to instill transaction integrity. In a payment application, the business requirement might be that a valid transaction must contain a payment (check, money order or cash voucher). With Intelligent Scanning it is easier, more efficient and thus less expensive, to address transaction violations at scan time vs. post-scan and post-data capture. TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS do not support interactive business rules. ImageTrac and SoftTrac allow users to setup these rules with a point-and-click job interface.

Recognition - OCR, color and MICR recognition are all options on the ImageTrac that enable further interactive processing. These recognition components provide information on what the piece of paper may contain and, in turn, trigger a sortation or action based on a business rule. TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS do not support such interaction.

Audit Trail Printing - Inkjet printing is a mainstay feature with high volume document processors. Many operations either have complex Document Locator Number (DLN) or legacy microfilm numbering schemes that must be matched. With TWAIN, Kofax and ISIS, the certainty of this printing cannot be assured. While some versions of the products support it, others require extensive programming directly with the printer outside the bounds of the third-party API. With the ImageTrac Scanning Platform, all printing functions are standard, including multiple printer options (pre-image or post-image). In addition, SoftTrac performs normal network printing for labels and batch sheets while processing work.

Multiple Image Output - This is a concept developed by Imaging Business Machines that ISIS has since incorporated with new scanners. Previously, an organization had to purchase a scanner for each application and produce the necessary multiple images for each downstream process, such as OCR, key-from-image or archival. The challenge with this is that these processes require different features of the image. The OCR process is concerned with characters and not form data. Key-from-image requires an exact reproduction of the image for human correction. Archive needs a good image that conserves space. The ImageTrac produces each of these different formats from a single scan. Unlike TWAIN and Kofax, SoftTrac can track and direct these multiple formats, or outputs, to different processing streams.

SUMMARY
Intelligent Document Scanning is quickly developing momentum. Organizations have driven down the cost of operations as much as they can with traditional technologies and approaches. The digital and Internet drive is introducing new business dynamics that cannot be filled effectively with current solutions. Everyone is looking for technology that can drive content throughout their organization at a much faster rate.

Intelligent Document Scanning addresses these demands by combining innovative hardware and sophisticated software. There are hundreds of Intelligent Scanning systems deployed around the world in a broad spectrum of industries. Imaging Business Machines' ImageTrac Scanning Platform is the only platform designed and built around this approach.

For more information about Imaging Business Machines and Intelligent Document Scanning, call 205/439.7100, visit www.ibml.com or email info@ibml.com.

Imaging Business Machines