In today’s digital age, businesses and individuals often deal with a large volume of invoices and receipts. Manually entering data from these documents into your accounting or management system can be time-consuming and error-prone. Fortunately, Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology can help automate this process by extracting text and data from scanned or photographed invoices. In this blog post, we will guide you through the process of creating an Invoice Scanner with OCR in C#, empowering you to save time and reduce errors in your financial workflows.
OCR Invoice Scanner - C# API Installation
To use OCR in your project, you need to install Conholdate.Total for .NET. You can do this via NuGet Package Manager plugin in Visual Studio or run the following installation command:
PM> NuGet\Install-Package Conholdate.Total
Create OCR Receipt Scanner in C#
The receipts are often shared in the form of images. You can easily create a receipt scanner using OCR in C# to process receipt images by following the steps below:
- Initialize an instance of the OcrInput class.
- Add the source image with the Add(string) method.
- Extract text from the invoice with OCR with the RecognizeInvoice(OcrInput, InvoiceRecognitionSettings) method.
- Save invoice text to file with the Save(string, SaveFormat, bool, SpellCheckLanguage, string) method.
The code snippet below demonstrates how to create OCR receipt scanner in C#:
Create Invoice Scanner with OCR for PDF in C#
Sometimes the receipts and invoices are compiled into a PDF document where multiple pages can contain several invoices. You can efficiently create an invoice scanner using OCR for PDF in C#. Please follow the steps below to process PDF invoices in your environment:
- Create an instance of the OcrInput class.
- Load the source PDF file by specifying the InputType enumeration.
- Read text from the invoices using the RecognizeInvoice(OcrInput, InvoiceRecognitionSettings) method.
- Export the invoice text to a TXT file with SaveFormat enumeration.
The code sample below shows how to create an invoice scanner with OCR for PDF in C#:
Free Evaluation License
You may get a free evaluation license for testing the APIs to their full capacity.
Summing Up
Automating the process of scanning and extracting data from invoices using OCR in C# can significantly streamline your financial workflows and reduce the risk of manual errors. In this blog post, we provided a basic outline of how to create an Invoice Scanner with OCR in C#. You can further enhance and customize this solution to meet the specific requirements of your business or project. For instance, you can improvise it to process a single or multiple images of receipts, use a PDF document containing invoices, a ZIP directory for compressed or archived receipts. Likewise, you can enahnce receipt images to preprocess them for OCR operations like resizing, resampling, cropping, etc. as per your requirements. However, you may write to us at the forum in case you want to discuss any of your queries or concerns.
FAQs
What is OCR, and why is it used in an invoice scanner?
OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition, a technology that converts images or scanned documents into editable and searchable text. In an invoice scanner, OCR is used to extract text from invoices, making it easier to process and manage invoice data digitally.
What steps are involved in creating an invoice scanner in C# with OCR?
The typical steps include image acquisition, OCR text extraction, data validation and parsing, and storing the extracted data in a structured format. You’ll also need to design a user-friendly interface for user interaction.
What are some challenges I might face when building an invoice scanner with OCR in C#?
Challenges may include handling different invoice formats, dealing with varying image qualities, ensuring high OCR accuracy, and implementing data validation and error handling.