http://ask.metafilter.com/tags/languagetools Questions tagged with 'languagetools' at Ask MetaFilter. Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:41:04 -0800 Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:41:04 -0800 en-us http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss 60 http://ask.metafilter.com/109130/And%2DJesus%2Ddid%2Dturn%2Dimage%2Dinto%2Dtext Is there a program I can download/buy/steal/borrow that can "read" scanned pictures of letters and transform them into digital text, like the letters I'm typing right now? Ideally this would include the unique letters and diacritical marks in many other languages like Portuguese, French, Russian, and Chinese. I ask because I would like to start reading the strange and fanciful books I've obtained overseas by scanning the pages and running them through the web 2.5 choiceness that is <a href="http://www.google.com/language_tools?hl=en">Google Fish</a>. I assume such a program is responsible for how I can <a href="http://books.google.com/books?q=%D0%9C%D0%BD%D0%B5+%D0%BD%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B2%D1%8F%D1%82%D1%81%D1%8F+%D0%B3%D0%BE%D0%BB%D1%8B%D0%B5+%D0%B6%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%89%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1%8B&btnG=Search+Books">search the text</a> <a href="http://books.google.com/books?q=%E6%88%91%E5%96%9C%E6%AC%A2%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD%E8%A3%B8%E4%BD%93%E5%A5%B3%E4%BA%BA&btnG=Search+Books">inside all those</a> <a href="http://books.google.com/books?q=%22it+was+a+dark+and+stormy+night%22&btnG=Search+Books">Google Books</a> (Either that or Google hired one million ancient Sumerian scribes to hand type the text of every book ever written).<br> <br> <small>And if such a program exists you are all free to copy my brilliant idea.</small> tag:ask.metafilter.com,2008:site.109130 Sat, 13 Dec 2008 09:41:04 -0800 language languagetools translation dgaicun