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That was the resonating thought left on people’s minds after attending Nexus 2009 at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, WA. The ILINX product line is a unique product offered only by ImageSource, Inc. It’s a flexible web-based capture software suite that allows a distributed capture solution. It has no volume licensing, so there is no limitation on how many documents are scanned. Attendees were very impressed with the ILINX products and how they co-exist with other capture software in the same environment.
“It so easy to become complacent with our day to-day routine, sometimes you need something to shake you and rejuvenate you! This is what our Nexus conference does for me. It gives me a chance to meet my customer and to be remind that what we do improves peoples work environment and in essence we improve our customers’ lives at work and we all know we spend more time at work than anywhere else so we are improving lives! I get a chance to see how our customer are excited about the changes in the market places and they are genuinely excited about improving their environments.“ – Ruben Kerson, Inside Sales Manager at ImageSource
Until next year everyone!!
Andrea Latham, CDIA+
Inside Sales
ImageSource, Inc.
Phone 360.943.9273
www.imagesourceinc.com
Scanning your documents into a Document Management System is a great way to improve efficiency and reduce the amount of paper in your office. And, depending on what kind of paper you are scanning, there are lot of document capture tools available. Tools such as Full Text OCR, Zonal OCR, and ICR can greatly reduce time spent indexing and validating your documents once they are scanned.
Full Text OCR (Optical Character Recognition) is software that captures every character in the document being scanned and processing it into a fully searchable PDF. One effective use of this technology is when government users needing to search hundreds of pages of agendas and meeting minutes for a certain topic. The process of searching these documents is quite time-consuming and most OCR processing occurs overnight when there is less use on the company’s day-to-day activities.
Zonal OCR is similar in that it captures information, but in this case, the software is programmed to look in the same location or “zone” every time. This is helpful when scanning in documents where the information is in the same location, such as an invoice number. Most invoices are in a set format so zonal OCR is very effective in this scenario. When the operator is validating this information, the Zonal OCR zooms in on the zone area that has been predetermined where the information is captured from so they can easily read if the information captured is correct or not. Hence, one of the biggest advantages of Zonal OCR is that it improves the efficiency of searches which translates into a savings of both time and money. Some software available that features Zonal OCR also allows the user to draw a box to establish a zone around required text rather than typing in keywords therefore allowing the document to be automatically indexed.
ICR (Intelligent Character Recognition) is the ability for the software to read hand-written information and process this into searchable information. This is especially beneficial in the financial industry. And although this tool can be very useful in some situations, the error rate is much higher because handwriting is so varied from person to person.
Andrea Latham, CDIA+
Inside Sales
ImageSource, Inc.
Phone 360.943.9273
www.imagesourceinc.com
Enterprise Resource Planning Systems (ERPs) integrate all data and processes of an organization into a unified system. A typical ERP system will use multiple components of computer software and hardware to achieve the integration. A key ingredient of most ERP Systems is the use of a unified database to store data for the various system modules. Most ERP Systems implementation require the standardization of business processes to match the system modules. Although this standardization is difficult during the first implementation, upgrades are quick and relatively inexpensive because of the standardized processes and modules. The process improvements this type of standardization enables are substantial. An imaging system allows you to bring this standardization of processes to your document handling.
ILINX Integrate is designed to complement a wide variety of enterprise systems. One of the biggest uses of ILINX is to provide imaging or document management functionality as a ‘bolt-on’ to existing ERP platforms. When the system integration is done right, most users do not even know they are using ILINX Integrate. It simply appears as if every needed document is stored right in the ERP system.
In addition to the ROI provided by the imaging itself, it also allows the most basic business processes to be enhanced through workflow applications. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) provides financial software that facilitates sharing information within the company whereby all departments or divisions can see what is transpiring elsewhere in the company. ERP provides transparent information management so that every division is apprised of events as they happen.
Integrating ERP with document imaging technologies using ILINX power and transform a business into a dynamic enterprise. To learn more about how ILINX products can enhance your current solution, please register for Nexus.
Andrea Latham, CDIA+
Inside Sales
ImageSource, Inc.
Phone 360.943.9273
Many people think that scanning documents only requires putting it in the feeder tray and pressing “scan”, but there are many steps that need to be followed when scanning documents into your Document Management System. Documents come in many shapes, thickness, sizes, and conditions, so the first step is to properly prepare the documents for scanning. “Document prep” is a highly important step before scanning, this assists in achieving the rated speed of the scanner and to avoid damage to its components. This includes removing staples, paperclips, or any metal fasteners that might be attached to the documents so that you do not cause damage as the paper is fed through the scanner. You also want to remove any post-it notes or small receipts and attach to a regular size piece of paper to avoid miss-feeding or jamming. Any crumpled or folded document will need to be flattened out so they feed correctly through the scanner. This seems a time consuming first step but it actually makes the scanning process more streamlined and efficient.
Once your documents are properly prepped, it is time to scan them. Often scanner operators will use separator pages to separate the batches of documents, to index the batches together correctly. This saves time with data input on the operator’s side. Scanning software functionality such as Kofax VRS, allows the operator to either manually alter the document to improve quality, or set up settings automatically to do this and speed up the quality assurance (checking the image) process. Once the batch of documents is scanned, Capture Software such as ILINX Capture or Kofax Capture allows the operator will use specific index fields to associate metadata with the documents. These metadata fields will accompany the image once released into repository software so that the document can be searched for and found in the future.
If done correctly, scanning documents can be an efficient business process that will save your company time and money….it is as simple as that! For a demonstration of document scanning (even bring your own documents), attend Nexus. Call Inside Sales at 360-943-9273 and mention this blog for a registration discount!
Andrea Latham, CDIA+
Inside Sales
ImageSource, Inc.
Phone 360.943.9273
Green business isn’t just talk anymore! Many companies today are working on Green Initiatives to make them more environmentally friendly. One popular initiative is to go “paperless” and implement a document imaging system. What could be more environmentally friendly than saving some paper, hence saving trees? Document management reduces paper creation, storage requirements, and travel costs. Online forms and signature eliminate paper at the source. There are many resources on Green Initiatives in the document imaging world provided by participating in groups such as AIIM, ARMA, and attending conferences that discuss these initiatives such as the ImageSource conference, “Nexus.”
When it comes to deciding what kind of scanners you need for your document imaging system, many companies are taking a harder look at which manufactures are producing environmentally friendly equipment. Some concerns include what type of chemicals used in the products, energy-saving modes, duplexing options, and if the manufacture recycles. Compared to other office equipment, (According to the EPA) a scanner consumes significantly less energy than a photocopier, resulting in lower green house gases.
American office workers use four million tons of copy paper annually, equivalent to 10,000 sheets of copy paper per worker. If the United States were to reduce office paper by 10%, 1.6 million tons of greenhouse gases could be eliminated, the same as removing 280,000 cars from the road. As more companies implement document management systems, their paper creation and use goes down and therefore create less greenhouse gases. Although our world is far from being completely paperless, we are surely making great strides in that direction and lessening our footprint on the environment in the process.
Andrea Latham, CDIA+
Inside Sales
ImageSource, Inc.
Phone 360.943.9273
