16.0.0

📅 2021-01-22

Introduction

From 2021 and on, we will gradually transition our iDRS 15 into a brand new major version: the OCR SDK 16.

One of the hard requirements is to keep backward compatibility, API and binary-wise, between different versions of the same major one. That is very helpful for you, integrators, who can then easily update the iDRS in your products without having to change your own code frequently; but as time goes by, more and more old or even deprecated APIs have to be kept available, which in turn impacts the workload needed for product maintenance or even for new developments.

This is why, after 8 years of lifetime for the iDRS 15, our development team is cleaning up the current API of the outdated elements and parameters, and is also taking this opportunity to review the package and binaries layout.

Scope of the updates

In a nutshell, our goal for this OCR SDK 16 is:

  • Simplifying. Most tasks aim at updating the parameters and the way they are exposed; This can be done thanks to the feedback gathered during the past years from integrators, and thanks to the team’s experience.

  • Optimizing the API by keeping the recommended methods and parameters only, and by removing the deprecated / legacy ones

  • Improving the usage: less parameters to handle means less complexity and thus better maintainability.

Transition period

In terms of deliverables, this shift will be made gradually over the coming months through regular updates.

Steps description

  1. Release version remains 16.0.N: the API can change from one release to another - no backward compatibility is guaranteed. Changelog mentions all removed or renamed parameters or features.

  2. Release version increments to 16.1: the C++ and .NET Framework APIs are set once again and backward compatibility is guaranteed. However, the .NET 5 API may still evolve - Go to chapter .NET 5 Windows API below for more details.

  3. Release version reaches 16.2: all the APIs are kept backward compatible.

The development team is doing its best to keep the '16.0' and '16.1' phases as short as possible.

New features

.NET 5 Windows API

Starting with this release, a .NET 5 API is available within the Windows packages, in addition to the existing .NET Framework API.

For the moment, this new API is very similar to the .NET Framework one; therefore switching from one to the other should be an easy step.

Future evolution of .NET 5 API
The .NET 5 API will evolve in the future when we will extend support on other platforms than Windows. At that point, you may need to update your source code accordingly.

Package for Windows ARM64 architecture

A new package is released alongside the usual ones: iDRS for Windows ARM64. This concludes the extension of availability on ARM processors, as Linux and macOS are already released.

Improvements

DOCX output with 'favor layout' configuration

This release includes a brand new writer for DOCX documents, resulting in better and more precise document layout when you select the 'favor layout' configuration (set the CDocxOutputParameters.ColumnMode property to Ignore).

Future releases will extend the usage of this new DOCX writer to the second use case: 'favor flowing text'.

Deprecated/removed features

N/A

Added/removed resources

N/A

Fixed bugs

ID Description

IDRSRD-5894

The iDRS can crash when generating page content from .NET API

IDRSRD-5886

The iDRS creates DOCX files without the correct list bullets

IDRSRD-5869

The iDRS does not use detected tabulations when creating office documents

IDRSRD-5858

The iDRS is extremely slow to generate PDF when output document memory limit is reached

IDRSRD-5854

The iDRS should propose a .NET 5 API on Windows platform

IDRSRD-5852

The iDRS does not read TIFF color palette properly for specific files

IDRSRD-5849

The iDRS is unable to load TIFF images with greyscale+alpha color mode

IDRSRD-5848

The iDRS documentation should clarify the cases where Visual Studio 2010 32bit redistributables are needed

IDRSRD-5839

The iDRS throws an exception when converting specific images to DOCX output format

IDRSRD-5832

The IDRS is incorrectly merging some lines when converting specific Hebrew images to DOCX output format

IDRSRD-5807

The iDRS does not output text in the expected order

IDRSRD-5799

The iDRS SDK fails to detect punch holes in specific document

IDRSRD-5783

The iDRS OCR binaries should be updated with latest jpeg library

IDRSRD-5782

The iDRS Barcode Evo I binaries should be updated with the latest jpeg library

IDRSRD-5754

The iDRS Barcode Evo I binaries should be updated with the latest zlib library

IDRSRD-5742

The iDRS miscomputes the default charset when changing OCR language from an Asian to an HQOCR one

IDRSRD-5664

The Korean OCR accuracy should be improved

IDRSRD-5550

The iDRS does not read properly very clear characters from specific documents

IDRSRD-3484

The iDRS does not output Arabic words in the correct order in DOCX

IDRSDEV-1081

The iDRS does not output content of columns succeeding an empty one

IDRSDEV-1070

The iDRS PDF loading binaries should be updated with the latest FreeType library

IDRSDEV-1069

The iDRS Document Output binaries should be updated with the latest zlib library

IDRSDEV-1068

The iDRS Imaging binaries should be updated with latest jpeg library

Known issues

N/A