I often carry out the following sequence (working on a personal multilingual with translation text to speech action for my DEVONthink files):
start with a non readable PDF (images of text)
OCR to RTF
convert resulting RTF to Text (direct PDF to text does not give good results)
Is there any way to make this sequence automatic, perhaps with a script or a smart rule?
I created the smart rule below but am hesitant to test (ie run) it:
I want to make sure that the rule will only apply to the selected file/item. If it applies to all PDFs in my database, it will be a disaster. What do I enter in “the following are true” to state that the rule applies to the selected file only.
I would like to confirm that the sequence of actions OCR→ Rich Text→ convert plain text is correct.
thanks in advance for your time and help
I want to make sure that the rule will only apply to the selected file/item. If it applies to all PDFs in my database, it will be a disaster.
Of course it would apply to all of them, and in all your databases. Look at your Search in and criteria. You have essentially filtered nothing.
And smart rules don’t act on the selection by default. If you want to do that, you can create a properly filtered smart rule. You can then use Tools > Apply Rule on a matching selection of documents. You can also drag and drop documents onto the rule.
You could also use a batch process if this was a one-off process but it doesn’t sound like it is.
Here is a properly filtered and restricted smart group that would do what you’re looking for in DEVONthink 3…
Smart rules do not process selected items usually but items that match the conditions after a certain event (e.g. On Import). A batch processing configuration of version 4 might be more useful here.
In addition, instead of the OCR action you have to use the OCR & Continue action so that the new item created by OCR is used by the following actions.
Haha! I shouldn’t reply at 2:00am as I had to double-check I hadn’t missed something
But OCR & Continue is a good idea, just as a Data > OCR > Apply command is
And @BLUEFROG SOO SORRY to interrupt you while you were in the arms of Orpheus.
“In the arms of Morpheus” refers to being asleep, specifically in a dreamlike state. Orpheus, in Greek mythology, was a legendary musician and poet whose music was said to have the power to charm animals, plants, and even the gods themselves
So it’s not really only the selected file/item, it’s anything in that group.
To focus on the selected item, I was thinking of adding a keyword like “$selected^” in the item I want to run the smart rule on and have the smart rule trigger when “name contains $selected^”.
BTW, while we’re not advocating DEVONthink 4 for production, the Tools > Apply Rule commands filter from the selection and are only enabled when matching files are detected.
