Parallel recognition of document images with a time-elapsed processing abortion to improve overall throughput

US5475770A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• CGK Computer Gesellschaft Konstanz mbH · DE

Inventors

• Helmut Mittelbach · Konstanz, DE
• Wilfried Kochert · Konstanz, DE

Key dates

• Filing date: Sep 20, 1994
• Grant date: Dec 12, 1995
• Expiry date: Sep 20, 2014

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06V10/75
• WIPO field: Computer technology
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

The image data (BDAT) associated with a respective document are transmitted to one of a plurality of recognition units for processing in a recognition process comprising a plurality of partial processes. The allocation of the processing jobs and the monitoring of the time cycles of the recognition processes is performed by a control unit (AU), by mean of which a timer is triggered to set the processing time of the recognition process in a recognition unit (e.g. RUn), the value of which is compared with an expected value for the processing time of the currently running partial process. The partial process results from the processing status of the recognition unit which is determined by status information and can be called at any time. If the status of the recognition unit is such that, on the basis of the time comparison, no potentially successful execution of the entire recognition process can be expected, this process is prematurely terminated by the control unit (AU) so that the recognition unit is available for accepting new document data, especially when all available recognition units are already busy with recognition tasks.