New Tool Aims To Speed-Read Cursive HandwritingNew Tool Aims To Speed-Read Cursive Handwriting

Decades ago, a schoolteacher named Evelyn Wood developed a course--that was turned into a successful business--to teach people across the world how to "speed-read," or dramatically increase the number of words they can read in a minute.

Software developer A2iA Corp. on Tuesday unveiled technology the company says can enable a computer to mimic a human speed-reader. Specifically, the A2iA DocumentReader is an automated data-capture and keyword-spotting software tool for unstructured, or free-form, cursive handwritten documents.

When integrated into other applications such as workflow and knowledge-management software, DocumentReader can quickly spot keywords that appear on cursive handwritten paper documents, such as medical forms, pharmacy prescriptions, police reports, and customer mail, says Courtney Rand, A2i2's director of marketing and sales.

For instance, a cellular-phone company's customer-service department could integrate the software into customer-relationship-management applications that would help distinguish handwritten letters from customers requesting a change of address for billing purposes, versus those canceling their cell-phone accounts, Rand says. In health care, the software could help researchers quickly identify, index, and sort thousands of handwritten medical forms of patients who were prescribed certain medications.

Users can define custom sets of keywords or phrases to be spotted.

A2iA has been around since 1991, with other products such as optical character recognition and other advanced recognition products used by large companies such as Lockheed Martin Corp. Rand says A2iA is licensing the software to developers, resellers, and end users to integrate into their applications.