Handle different layout of document using kofax

Question

I am new to KofaxTotalAgility solution, but i am well aware of OCR, OMR and recognition mechanism.

I have two forms in one folder, A and B. both of them are identical, but due to manual scan there are slight axes change, say 20 pixel right shift, so Layout is slightly differ.

Layout of Image A and Image B are different, position of a form in a page are not fix. I know, other solution like "abbyy fine reader", provide flexilayout where we can handle this by finding the text and setting up right left top down to automatically identify zones.

As i have started learning KofaxTotalAgility, i am unaware of all option provided by "kofax Transformation Designer".

My question is which Locator should i use, i am currently using/working-on advance zone locator and for one document(Image A) which i set as a reference, extraction is proper. But for other,(Image B) due to layout mismatch text/box field are not getting extracted.

Can anyone point out the right direction from where i can get this case handled properly. I know, i am asking direct option/solution, any help is highly appreciable.

Answer 1

In general, Kofax Transformations has two groups of locators:

• Deterministic. You tell the locator precisely what to do, and how to do it (similar to an imperative approach when programming)
• Probabilistic. You just tell your locator what to extract, and it works out the rest (based on AI).

Here's a (non-exhaustive) diagram I created the other day:

When working with forms, you might be tempted to rely on forms-specific locators such as the Advanced Zone Locator. While this locator can account for fields "moving around", for example due to images being jolted, zoomed, or distorted, there are certain limitations. Other locators don't have these limitations - the format locator for example allows you to define a certain pattern (a Regular Expression) that should be matched along with a keyword that has to be found somewhere around that pattern.

For your example, you could create a regex like M|F|X, and then define "Gender" as the keyword that needs to be present on the left.

However, any locator that's ruled by determinism follows Murphy's law - at some point that keyword might change. There could be different languages. And maybe additional letters for certain genders might be added; ultimately breaking your extraction logic.

Enter AI - while Murphy's law still applies when using Group Locators, the difference here is that users can train the system to pick up the new data. Said locator will automatically work out the best way to extract that piece of data. If you used a format locator, the customer would need to get back to you to add additional expressions, or have the keywords changed.

In your particular case, I'd try to use a Trainable Group Locator first. If you already know what you're looking for - for example SSNs that you have somewhere in a database, go for the Database Locator. Use Format Locators as a last resort, as tempting as they may be. Advanced Zone Locators are useful when you deal with forms, but I find myself using them almost exclusively for handprint or checkbox recognition.