Analysis of the Logical Layout of Documents

This chapter provides a comprehensive review of the state of the art in the field of automated document understanding, highlights key methods developed for different target applications, and provides practical recommendations for designing a document understanding system for the problem at hand.

Abstract

Automatic document understanding is one of the most important tasks when dealing with printed documents since all post-ordered systems require the captured but process-relevant data. Analysis of the logical layout of documents not only enables an automatic conversion into a semantically marked-up electronic representation but also reveals options for developing higher-level functionality like advanced search (e.g., limiting search to titles only), automatic routing of business letters, automatic processing of invoices, and developing link structures to facilitate navigation through books. Over the last three decades, a number of techniques have been proposed to address the challenges arising in logical layout analysis of documents originating from many different domains. This chapter provides a comprehensive review of the state of the art in the field of automated document understanding, highlights key methods developed for different target applications, and provides practical recommendations for designing a document understanding system for the problem at hand.