System for entering data into a data processing system

摘要

The present invention is a data entry system for extracting data from an image. The system displays a number of data capture windows corresponding to data fields employed in a data processing application, such as accounting software. The system allows the user to position the capture windows over the associated data in the image and automatically extracts the digital string under the window as the value of the associated data field. The system then submits all the data field values to the data processing application as if the user had entered them directly into a data entry screen in the data processing application.

主权项

1. A data entry system for extracting data from an image displayed on a screen viewable by a user and associating the extracted data with application data fields, values of which application data fields a data processing application is configured to receive, each application data field having a field name, wherein the image comprises one or more than one image field, each of the image fields being a portion of the image containing image field data, the data entry system comprising a computer processor running a software application, the software application being configured to cause the computer processor to:
(a) permit the user to designate a portion of the displayed image as one of the image fields; (b) in response to the user's designation of the portion of the displayed image as one of the image fields, process the designated portion and convert the image field data in the designated portion to a digital string; (c) receive an indication of the field name of the application data field that corresponds to the image field data; (d) associate the digital string with the indicated field name of the application data field to create application data field information; and (e) provide the application data field information to the data processing application, wherein permitting the user to designate the portion of the displayed image as one of the image fields comprises: (i) first displaying a movable data capture window on the screen, the data capture window comprising a capture data field area, and then permitting the user to drag the data capture window over the displayed image so that the image field data in the image field in the displayed image is under the capture data field area of the data capture window; or (ii) the user touching or otherwise indicating an image field point within the displayed image to indicate where in the image the image field is located and the computer processor then displaying a data capture window comprising a capture data field area over the displayed image so that the image field data in the image field in the displayed image containing the indicated image field point is under the capture data field area of the data capture window, and wherein the data entry system maintains a database of images including the image used to extract the digital string that was provided to the data processing application in the application data field information, along with the location of the data capture window when the system converted the image field data to the digital string.