"make text searchable" not working

[Pardes]

I scanned a page of my handwriting (which was quite legible) and then pulled
it into OneNote (insert>pictures.form files), the image on the page looked
good, right clicked and checked "make text searchable." Then I searched on
an obvious word in the text.

What a let-down! No match. So I tried "copy text from picture" and pasted
it to a new page and only saw a few letters and symbols. Nothing related to
the hand-writtten words.

What gives? Help.

Pardes

 

[Ben M. Schorr, MVP]

My bet is that OneNote is just not able to recognize your handwriting. Keep
in mind that the handwriting recognition provided by the Tablet PC OS is not
really an OCR-based system and wouldn't come into play here.

--
-Ben-
Ben M. Schorr, MVP
Roland Schorr & Tower
http://www.rolandschorr.com
http://www.officeforlawyers.com/onenote.htm

 

[Pardes]

That's what I thought too, at first. So I scanned in some printed material.
A search of a word or two in it gave no matches. However, in this case, it
was able to copy the text and paste it elsewhere.

So what appears to be the problem is, why didn't a search work? If it could
copy and paste the text, it should be able to find a search word too.

I'm perplexed. Are others here able to find search words in images?

 

[YouBetcha]

I doubt you will be able to scan in your handwriting as an image and be able
to have OneNote recognize the text, either for searching or for "copying text
from page". I think nearly all OCRs still depend on the text to be actual
computer-produced font for them to work (well). Even computer fonts, when
faxed, can have enough distortion to throw an OCR off sometimes.

I would say the other part, where you scanned in a text page but couldn't
search right away, may just need a few minutes. Sometimes windows desktop
search is doing other things or is paused so it takes a while for it to
register the new information with its database. can you try to search for
something on the same page again and see if it works now?

 

[Pardes]

You clever devil! You were right. After some time passed it searched the
printed text perfectly, even down to very very small text. I'm impressed. I
guess it really did need time to index itself.

The handwriting is another matter. Still no luck there. I'm not expecting
miracles and will be fine if it's not possible but I thought I read a note
that someone was about to do it. Perhpas it was a dream.

Thanks for you help!

 

[YouBetcha]

Believe me, I would love it, too, if I could scan hand-written text and have
it work. However, my handwriting is not even readable by people, so I knew
from the outset that something else would have to suffice.

Good luck!