OCR4all

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Setup guide – Linux ​

Preparation ​

You have to prepare the following folder structure:

...
├── ocr4all
│   ├── data
│   |   ├── [Your book]
│   |   |   ├── input
│   |   |   |   ├── 0001.png
│   |   |   |   ├── 0002.png
│   |   |   |   ├── ...
│   |   ├── [Another book]
│   |   |   ├── input
│   |   |   |   ...
│   ├── models
...

Explanation:

  • ocr4all (main folder)
  • models (folder for the neural network models)
  • data (folder for the documents you want to recognize)
  • [Your book] (folder that contains all data of a single, specific print/book)
  • input (folder for original, coloured / grayscaled book scans on page level)

Docker Setup ​

OCR4all setup ​

  • The OCR4all folder structure detailed above (Preparation) can be located anywhere you want.
  • Open a terminal inside the OCR4all folder and load an OCR4all image by using the following command (this will take up a few minutes and requires a stable connection to the internet):
docker pull uniwuezpd/ocr4all
  • Create the OCR4all container using the following command:
sudo docker run -p 1476:8080 \
    -u `id -u root`:`id -g $USER` \
    --name ocr4all \
    -v $PWD/data:/var/ocr4all/data \
    -v $PWD/models:/var/ocr4all/models/custom \
    -it uniwuezpd/ocr4all
  • Do not enter line breaks manually!

Browser access and further use ​

  • OCR4all is optimized for Chrome/Chromium.
  • Browser access: http://localhost:1476/ocr4all/
  • If you want to check whether the mapping is working correctly you can add the example projects Cirurgia and GNM from here to your data directory. In the browser, check Project Overview -> Project selection: If you can find the two aforementioned books (or any other book that you added), the mapping (-v $PWD/data:/…) is working properly.
  • Otherwise, it´s likely that there was a typo in the “docker run” command, so you will have to create the container again. First, delete the container you just created:
  • Stop the process in the terminal using CTRL+C, then type:
docker rm ocr4all
  • Check and correct your command (as with most terminals, you can sift through your previous commands using the arrow keys), especially the -v $PWD/data:/… lines, then run it again.
  • If everything is set up properly, you are able to restart OCR4all in the future by using:
docker start –ia ocr4all