OCE in its latest Scan Logic software for the popular TDS range of digital engineering printers includes scan with direct conversion to PDF as well as the most common formats, setting a new milestone in wide format engineering printing and copying.

Today, scanning capabilities are a driving force in the engineering market because people want to be able to store drawings in an electronic format where they are always instantly available to view, edit, distribute and print electronically.

Key underlying trends that are driving the expansion of the digital archive are:

* The network infrastructure.

* Ever better price/performance CAD packages.

* The expansion in enterprise-wide EDM/PDM systems.

* Digital wide format multifunctional systems.

The time and money saved from the ability to search, view, transmit/distribute and print documents electronically as opposed to requesting, searching, running off copies and distributing manually has made digital archiving of drawings essential for companies and organisations that want to remain competitive. Most companies, have hard copy original archives that have the possibility to be converted and stored digitally, or can provide the services to do so (commercial reprographics).

Scan-to file

STF is the process of capturing legacy data from paper drawings, or microfilm cards and converting this into a digital file. Scanning is conducted in raster format where the information is converted to pixels (dots), whereas CAD applications rely on vector information (co-ordinates that specify lines, shapes etc). Therefore, when a scan is made of a legacy drawing, the resultant digital file is in the first instance suitable mainly for archiving (analog to digital conversion) and printing.

At some point in time, the digital file of the drawing may need to be modified in some way, just as an original drawing would be changed. There are a number of options to do this such as:

* Raster editing. Here simple raster editing takes place.

* CAD (vector) overlay. This is where the raster file is placed in the CAD application, and on top of it is created the modification in vector, creating a vector overlay. This will become a hybrid file.

* Raster to vector conversion, then modify in vector form and save as a native CAD file.

Legacy drawings

Even if they are of good quality, old drawings could become brittle and are easily damaged becoming unworkable. The original drawing print quality can deteriorate over time, particularly if stored in less than optimal conditions.

Further, technical documents require a lot of space to store, and there is always the risk to fire and flood, particularly as many archives are located in basements. In addition, companies are downsizing so even fewer people are available to manage the archive effectively and provide a suitable turnaround time and service level for in- house reprographic services. Of course, lower resource levels can lead to misfiled or even lost drawings. 5-10 minutes per search can easily be wasted due to misfiled, documents. Statistics show that between 1 and 5% of documents become misfiled whilst 25% of searching for drawings is walking to and from one's desk.

Benefits of scanning to file legacy drawings?

* Effective archiving of legacy data. Document security and control.

* Disaster recovery and back-up of critical original documents.

* Quick and easy access to original documents when they are needed in a digital database.

* The chance of lost or misplaced documents are virtually eliminated in a digital database.

* Re-use of information is maximised across the enterprise. Duplication of effort in creating data is eliminated.

* Increased productivity from each employee. Ensure that high cost designers spend most of their time designing in CAD and not waiting for legacy drawings from the central archive.

* Decentralisation. Ability to create a pull rather than a push system. Distributing digital engineering drawings to remote locations, or pulling from the archive directly and then viewing then printing them on local printers saves time and money.

* Quick, cost-effective modifications to old drawings, ie raster editing.

* Be able to print, old drawings locally, right away rather than request and wait for a copy of an original.

* Cost-effective storage methods. Reduce space required to store paper archive.

* Avoid using costly repro services.

Networks

With the advent of network and Internet technologies, most companies and organisations operate within some form of a network environment. Today, this is expanding further still with company intranets where differently located sites can access the same information. e-mail and the web allow for the transmission of digital information anywhere in the world. Having access to digital information increases productivity, by increasing the flow of information. Drawings available digitally are far easier to access and print than searching for and duplicating originals. This makes it even more important that companies convert their legacy paper archives into digital format.

PDF

For some time the most common file formats that were used to save scanned images were TIFF and CALS, and there are a number of viewers which with some limitations are able to read this format and do some editing as well.

Another file format was PDF that could convert images and text, and describe the files as if they were printed with all the necessary information including the fonts used. A PDF file is like a container that holds everything that would otherwise have to supply as separate files. Also the use of sophisticated compression techniques means that the file can be kept small, so that it can even be sent via e-mail.

Furthermore, the PDF is platform independent and can be viewed across multiple platforms with Acrobat Reader which is free. Until now, the only way to convert a scanned file to PDF was by means of Adobe Acrobat package at a price. Now, OCE's Scan Logic software includes scan with direct conversion to PDF as well as the most common formats.

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