[HN Gopher] Show HN: Open Scanner, an open-source document scann...
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Show HN: Open Scanner, an open-source document scanning app for
iPhone
Author : ductionist
Score : 122 points
Date : 2024-09-17 16:36 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (github.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
| nashashmi wrote:
| "Hey siri, scan document".
|
| I guess you can provide an alt for people who didn't activate
| siri.
| miles wrote:
| Thanks so much for crafting and sharing this app. Was just
| chatting with a friend about scanning via Notes[1], which is a
| little clunky for quickly and seamlessly sharing a scan.
|
| A few feature suggestions:
|
| * Allow setting default color mode (having to switch manually to
| B&W every time adds another step)
|
| * Allow setting setting type (PDF, JPG, TXT) and size (Original,
| Medium, Small) in Sharing Options a la Scanner Pro[2]
|
| * Allow sharing immediately after scanning rather than first
| having to tap Save then opening the image again
|
| [1] https://support.apple.com/en-us/108963
|
| [2] https://readdle.com/scannerpro
| zamadatix wrote:
| Apart from being clunky Apple's Notes app has some just... odd
| limitations. E.g. you can only scan 24 pages in a note, because
| reasons?
| chazeon wrote:
| You can actually directly scan in the Files app from the triple
| dots menu in the upper right corner, this will allow you to
| directly scan as a PDF file.
| nialse wrote:
| Mind blown. Thanks for telling me about this gem.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| I love Apple, but this is so Apple: hidden powerful
| functionality you'll only know about through word of mouth or
| intentional exploration in the UI.
| criddell wrote:
| It's also documented in the iPhone User Guide.
|
| You can get it through Books or on the web:
|
| https://support.apple.com/en-
| gb/guide/iphone/iphf2746307f/18...
| minkles wrote:
| No one reads the manuals these days.
|
| Apart from me apparently.
| elashri wrote:
| I work mainly with undocumented stuff. That taught me to
| appreciate when there is manuals and documentation for
| anything and I read them. I don't watch YouTube videos, I
| read the manual. Of course until I can't figure it out
| and then still look into YouTube anyway.
| marcellus23 wrote:
| ...or the manual.
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| Exploring the UI is a perfectly valid method of discovering
| functionality. What's the alternative? The phone
| interrupting you every 2 steps saying hey by the way, you
| can also do this and this from here?
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Now, I'll probably ask Siri. "How can I scan a document
| with native iOS functionality?" Hopefully I get the right
| answer back from the LLM!
|
| (Admittedly, I have never read the manual for any iPhone
| I've owned; mea culpa)
| mrbombastic wrote:
| It also shows up as a shortcut in spotlight if you search
| for "Scan Document"
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| Valid, yes. But this should never be the sole method of
| discovery.
|
| Good UX provides clues to discovering additional
| functionality without intruding on the user.
|
| What's the alternative? That's a question for a UX team -
| something Apple can certainly afford.
| loloquwowndueo wrote:
| Clicking on a kebab and getting a clearly-labeled "scan
| document" option seems like an eminently followable clue.
| It's not like it's a minuscule inscrutable icon three
| levels down.
| manmal wrote:
| And you can scan to any cloud provider that integrates with
| Files that way. Dropbox etc
| terraplura wrote:
| Came here to say the same. I wonder how this app compares.
| One perk this app provides is you have a button to press from
| your home screen. With the native feature, you could set up
| an Apple shortcut to start scanning a document and create a
| button on your home screen.
| nesk_ wrote:
| Not sure how this compares to the scanner in the native Files
| app? https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/scan-documents-ios-files-
| ap...
| dxbednarczyk wrote:
| What benefit does Open Scanner have over using the "Scan
| Document" iPhone shortcut? For sync/sharing I usually just
| AirDrop the scan to my Mac.
| darknavi wrote:
| I am partial to QuickScan[1] as it is free and has no ads. It
| does not seem to be open source though.
|
| [1] https://www.quickscanapp.com/
| miles wrote:
| QuickScan looks great and has loads of features, but it might
| be more accurately described as "nagware" since a donation
| request is shown on every export until a donation is made
| (after which point it can be disabled via Settings > Other
| settings > "Do not show donation request"). Nothing wrong with
| that; if I were a user I'd certainly donate, just wanted to let
| other potential users know.
| post_break wrote:
| It's funny how we tolerate Winrar doing that but on the phone
| it seems more annoying.
| darknavi wrote:
| Good point. I must have donated at some point because I use
| it often and don't remember seeing that.
| teeray wrote:
| I would love paperless-ngx export support for this
| 0XAFFE wrote:
| There is Paperparrot[1] which allows to directly scan documents
| or add existing documents to your paperless instance from your
| phone.
|
| [1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/paperparrot/id1663665267
| bbor wrote:
| Looks incredible! As someone preparing a large iPhone-based
| scanning project, this couldn't have come at a better time. I'm a
| longtime CamScanner user, but will happily move to something open
| source if it delivers on its promises. Will try it out asap!
|
| Re:the common "why not just use the native functionality"
| questions, I think the simple answer is scale. If I want to scan
| a random receipt I'd use Apple, but as we all know well, Apple
| rarely caters to power users -- someone scanning multiple times a
| day or for hours at a time will almost definitely be better
| served by a dedicated app.
|
| Side note: these (two!!) devs are killing it. Great communication
| (their privacy policy is top-notch), great styling, and they have
| a whole _roster_ of neat apps lined up, including an Apple Vision
| release. Thanks for putting them on my radar, OP!
| https://pencilresearch.com/
| zeagle wrote:
| I don't have an iPhone but thinking of switching from Android and
| my work flows. Can this sync saving to a SMB network folder so
| paperless-ngx imports it?
| mmmlinux wrote:
| iOS can connect to SMB and scan documents out of the box with
| the built in files app.
| zeagle wrote:
| That's great to know. Thanks!
| sandreas wrote:
| Does it support page dewarping[1] and 1bit color Palette PNG in
| PDF so shrink filesize[2]? I would love to See these features...
|
| 1: https://github.com/LittleTrickster/PDF-Doc-
| Scan/issues/17#is...
|
| 2: https://github.com/LittleTrickster/PDF-Doc-
| Scan/issues/7#iss...
| tmaly wrote:
| When it says it saves it to its own library, does this mean scans
| will not appear in Photos? Is there a way to clean up older files
| in the library?
| ductionist wrote:
| That's right, scans don't appear in Photos. You can delete
| pages or scans with the usual iPhone controls (swipe left to
| show the Delete button, etc.)
| dmd wrote:
| This functionality is already built into the iPhone - in the
| Notes app, and also in the Files app. What does your software
| add?
| thefourthchime wrote:
| Why is my first thought that this has a clever backdoor to find
| passwords and crypto keys?
| ein0p wrote:
| Integrated, single purpose app. Most people don't even know
| Notes has OCR. I didn't until late last year, even though I've
| been iPhone user since the original came out.
| pjot wrote:
| The camera and photos.app has ocr as well.
|
| Whenever im wanting to copy text on an app that hijacks the
| clipboard (LinkedIn/Slack) I take a screenshot, highlight the
| text, and copy as you would normally.
| nashashmi wrote:
| Try searching universally for stuff like invoice and you will
| get a copy of the invoices you have taken a picture of.
|
| Google photos has a feature where it recognizes documents
| like credit cards and so you can search for them.
| wincent wrote:
| 1.3 MB download.
| chrisweekly wrote:
| Related tangent: IF you already use Dropbox, FYI the Dropbox iOS
| app's scan feature is excellent.
| ryankrage77 wrote:
| Awesome that it's free, open-source, and ad-free. My
| understanding is you have to pay to publish even free apps on the
| App store - are the devs providing this at their own expense?
| ductionist wrote:
| Dev here - we already have a developer membership from our
| other (monetized) apps, so releasing this doesn't cost us any
| additional money.
| ThrowawayTestr wrote:
| I thought it was only $100 a year
| andrei-akopian wrote:
| For Android I recommend "OSS Document Scanner" it is just as good
| as MS Lens and CamScanner in my experience.
|
| - https://github.com/Akylas/OSS-DocumentScanner
|
| - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38848423
| theogravity wrote:
| Congrats on the release. Open Scanner looks like a good
| alternative to the paid TurboScan (it's what I've been using for
| over 5+ years):
|
| https://apps.apple.com/us/app/turboscan-pro-pdf-scanner/id34...
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(page generated 2024-09-17 23:00 UTC)