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I Have A Canoscan Lide 300 Scanner/Copier That Doesn't Let Me Edit

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zingo1327 | 20:01 Tue 16th Feb 2021 | Technology
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When i scan a document it scans ok to my computer but I can't edit it. I've tried saving it, closing it, reopening it but I still can't make changes to the doc.I've tried Autoscan,PDF scan,OCR scan,and document scan. None of which lets me edit the scanned document???? I got in touch with Canon but the link I was sent wasn't found and the online manual was no longer available. The guide they sent me doesn't work either. I've had 3 or 4 scanners through the years and had no problems.I have Windows 10.Hope someone can help.Thank you in advance
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A scanner basically 'takes a photo' of your document. Just as if you took a photograph of, say, the front page of a newspaper, there's no way that you can edit the text when you view the image on your computer.

The OCR option enables you to 'extract' the text, so that it can be edited in Word (or similar) but it won't retain other aspects of the image.

Unless you're prepared to scan the whole image, then use a second (OCR) scan to extract the text, open the image in a desktop publishing program and over-write the text sections with the edited OCR text, what you're trying to do is simply impossible. Sorry!
I think your problem may be in relying on the scanning buttons on the front of the scanner. I've got the same machine and had the same problem.
If you've linked the machine by USB cable to your Windows 10 computer it should have automatically downloaded the necessary software.
On your toolbar click on the 'Windows key' (black & white flag). This should open your list of available programmes.
Scroll down the list and (under 'c') you should see 'Canon utilities'.
Click on the down arrow beside this and it should offer "ij scan utility"
Click on this it will open on your desktop.
From this you should be able to scan a PDF, which once saved (in Documents) can be opened allowing you to highlight and copy/save/alter text within the scanned document.
Hope this helps
^^^ There are two types of pdf documents. One is editable, the other isn't. To the best of my knowledge, no scanner can produce an editable pdf. (Indeed, I can't see how it could be done).
Question Author
Hi guys . sorry for the delay. Tinker Wales. I have the ij scan utility on my desktop screen. I open it and select "scan pdf document". It scans fine and i name it and save it in the Docs folder. I open it and although I am now getting a flashing cursor I still can't type/delete/etc.
As I've tried to indicate above, the type of pdf file that's generated by a scanner is (like a jpeg file) basically a photograph of your document. It 'knows' which bits are black, which bits are white and which bits are different colours, etc but it has absolutely no 'knowledge' of the actual text that's within it. (i.e. it doesn't 'see' letters such as "a b c"; it simply 'sees' black shapes on the page). So you CAN'T edit any text within the picture because there's no text information in it to start with.

The ONLY way you can get text from a scanner is to use the OCR function. That 'takes a picture' of your document and then runs that picture through a special program, which looks at all the black squiggles on the page and attempts to 'read' them as letters. The result is a basic text file, which will hopefully contain all the words and sentences from the document but which won't hold any other features of the document (such as pictures, logos, information about text fonts and sizes, etc).

For example, if you were to create a pdf scan from this photo
https://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/05/30/79/5307988_8e1ea79c.jpg
you'd end up with a document which looked exactly the same but was in the pdf file format. Opening it in a pdf reader (or any other program capable of opening a pdf document) wouldn't enable you to edit the information on the road sign because it's a 'photo', not a text document.

You could scan the image using OCR software but that would just result in a file which read "M1 The NORTH Belfast 8". All other information in the picture would be lost.

It's just the same when, say, you copy that nasty letter that the tax man has sent you. If you choose pdf format, you'll end up with a 'photo' of the letter, where the text can't be edited because your computer doesn't 'see' any text; it just sees a picture.

If you use your scanner's OCR option, you'll get a text file containing all the threats from the tax man but nothing else from his letter. (e.g. the file you get won't include the layout of the letter, the HMRC logo at the top of it, the information that the amount owed is in red or that the font used in the letter head is different from that in the body text of the letter. It will contain just the bare text and absolutely nothing else).

It's simply NOT POSSIBLE to scan a document and end up with the non-text areas 'photographed' but with the text areas lifted out, run through OCR software, then dropped backed into place so that you've got editable text within the image. IT CAN'T BE DONE!!
Question Author
thanks for the input guys. I'll just have to retype the document and make any adjustments as I go along.
Thanks for your response.

If it's only the text that matters in the document (and you've no interest whatsoever in the pictures, logos, etc in it) then you can use the OCR option to create a text file. You can then import the text into a new Word document (or similar) and work from there.

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