I wish operating systems had native document scanning support.
I bought a scanner years ago in an attempt to manage paper load: scan to PDF, electronically file, and shred the original. It’s a great feeling to find an important document electronically, instead of sorting through reams of paper (and then having to scan it).
I just want simple “scan to PDF” — why are the tools so bad? The software supplied with my scanner stopped working one day (on Windows — it just went to permanent hourglass). I gave up trying to fix it, and turned to the world of $20 scan-to-PDF applications, most of which are pretty crappy.
Am I missing some easy solution?
I remember the days when sound cards were add-ons: driver hell, version conflicts, limited app support, etc. Apple and Microsoft: please provide bundled, well-designed, and well-integrated document scanning!
MS Office comes with tools that are not great but acceptable for working with TIFFs when combined that with the scanning / faxing wizard.
I have been digitally storing docs for about 2 years now. I have found that I still need a filing / storage schema so that I can track stuff down.
Having docs available wherever I am and checked in to SVN is fantastic though.
(I would also recommend combining this with a fax to email service for incoming faxes to cut out the whole scanning step. You can even fax documents to yourself and let that service deal with it…)
Jim
Andy,
I was feeling the same way until I got my Neat Receipts scanner. Simple and small form factor with only two buttons, “Scan” and “PDF”, the latter scanning your doc directly to a PDF. Nice and simple.
Pretty happy with software and hardware although it does require a reboot on my Mac to install. Yuck!
http://www.neatreceipts.com/products/neat-receipts-for-mac