Scanning documents

Point the camera at a page, check the corners, and the page is saved straightened, found by its text and ready for a PDF.

Scan turns the camera into a document scanner. Point it at a page, check the four corners, and the app saves the page straightened, as a photo in a folder you already sync. From there it is found like any other photo, by the text printed on it too, and a few pages make one PDF.

01 · Taking a page
  • Tap Scan in the header, next to Me. The first time, the app asks for the camera.
  • Hold the phone over the page. An outline follows the page’s edges while you aim, on a plain desk as well as on wood, a patterned cloth or a cluttered table.
  • Tap the round button to take the photo.
02 · The corners
  • The photo opens with the four corners already on the page. Drag any of them with your finger if it is off.
  • Save straightens the page into a flat rectangle, at the full resolution of the camera. Retake goes back to the camera.
  • After a save the camera comes back for the next page; the count at the top says how many pages you saved.
03 · Where the pages go
  • Into a folder the app already syncs: a DCIM folder when one is on your list, otherwise the first of your folders. Each page is named Scan_ with the date and time.
  • Android takes new photos only in DCIM and Pictures folders. If none of your folders is one, the scanner says so: add one in Sync, Change folders.
  • A page carries no location. It syncs like any new photo, and on a plan with vector search its printed text is read, so a receipt is found by its total and a letter by a word in it.
04 · Pages into one PDF
  • Tick the pages in the order you want them, tap PDF in the selection bar, name the file and choose where to save it.
  • Page one of the PDF is the photo you ticked first, page two the second, and so on.
  • Each photo goes in at up to 300 dpi, sharp enough for OCR, so the file stays small. Your photos are not changed.

Opensolr Photos is open source and MIT licensed. Questions about your Opensolr account, index or plan go to opensolr.com/contact; questions about the app itself belong on GitHub.

Opensolr Photos Documentation