-- Posted by ElfQrin at 8:17 pm on July 3, 2009 So here me out. I want to be able to scan in a document via my scanner into my computer, then be able to edit the text like it was a document on my computer instaed of retyping it. I think Xerox makes a product like this, but not sure what it's called. Do these types of programs really work? What's a good one? -- Posted by devilmaycrydude at 8:18 pm on July 3, 2009 lexmark imaging studio just select word document for me. -- Posted by cyanotype at 8:21 pm on July 3, 2009 I don't think they work that well. You'd need specific fonts and angles and stuff for it. -- Posted by Maxie at 8:29 pm on July 3, 2009 Try googling "optical character recognition." -- Posted by Charolastra at 2:57 pm on July 4, 2009 Yeah these do exist, and as you said it is to save the user time from being able to edit and work with scanned documents and text. The software is called OCR or optical character recognition. For the most recognizable font types like Serif and San Serif, it's pretty much magic. I've used it a number of times when I'd be writing an essay for school, would have deleted the document, and then once I scan it in, it will be available once again almost exactly as the original document. However some of them have a bit of trouble recognizing the difference between an I and a lower case L at times because in some fonts, the difference is negligible or not at all prevalent. So just watch out for that. The most easily accessible OCR comes right with Microsoft Office. It's called MS Document Imaging and it comes part of the software I think starting Office 2003. There are also many open-source OCRs these days because Google spends tons of their time scanning in books and making them available in searchable text form. Ocropus is a free, open-source OCR that you can use, developed by Google: http://code.google.com/p/ocropus/ http://www.isri.unlv.edu/ISRI/OCRtk But Document Imaging is your best bet if you're on a school computer and need your document characteristically recognized. Many scanners also come with the software these days. Hope this helps.