Preserving electronic documents over archival time spans can be a challenge for many businesses and organizations. The TIFF format has been widely adopted over years but does not provide access to underlying text or a mechanism for capturing logical structure. In addition, many statutory, regulatory, and institutional policies mandate the retention of PDF-based documents over multiple generations of technology but the feature-rich nature of PDF can complicate preservation efforts.
What is the ISO 19005-1 standard?
The ISO 19005-1 standard is the first in a new family of ISO Standards to address the growing need to maintain information in electronic documents over archival time spans. It is used in the document management industry to define a format (PDF/A-1) for the long-term archiving of electronic documents. PDF/A-1 is in fact a subset of PDF, leaving out PDF features not suited to long-term archiving. For example, PDF documents are not necessarily self-contained, meaning that they are using system fonts and content stored outside of the original file. As time passes and technology changes, these external connections can be broken and information can be lost.
Benefits of using the PDF/A-1 format for long-term document archival
- Device Independent - The PDF/A-1 format can be reliably and consistently rendered without regard to the hardware or software platform
- Self-contained - Contains all resources necessary for rendering documents
- Self-documenting - Contains its own description
- Unfettered - Absence of technical file protection mechanisms
- Available - Authoritative specification publicly available
- Adoption - Widespread use may be the best deterrent against preservation risk
The PDF/A-1 format should be used as a way to standardize the use of PDF for electronic document archival and ensure that these documents will be available well into the future in order to support business needs that require reliable rendering of electronic documents over the long term.
Automate the conversion process with OCR
OCR (Optical Character Recognition) is used to convert images that are rendered by faxes, scanners and printers into fully searchable PDF/A-1 files that are compliant with the ISO standard. If done manually, this process can be time consuming and costly. This is where server-based OCR software such as ExpressRecognition Server can help you solve problems and face the challenge of preserving electronic documents over archival time spans.
Unlike many other server-based OCR solutions, ExpressRecognition Server is fully automated and can convert images to the ISO 19005-1 standard in one single step, thus avoiding the need to convert images to PDF and then use another tool or separate process to convert to PDF/A. By combining both processes, ExpressRecognition Server can help reduce potential errors associated with multiple steps while being cost efficient.
Give ExpressRecognition Server a try with our 30 days trial version!
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“ExpressRecognition Server is a powerful server-based OCR software. Using it, users can easily convert images to PDF/A documents with speed and accuracy and comply with the new ISO 19005-1 standard.”
Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease LLP
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