A year ago, Microsoft launched a free document scanning app called Office Lens for Windows Phone. Since its inception, the app has become one of the most popular free windows phone app by having over 18,000 reviews and it is now available on platforms outside of Windows Phone.
Office Lens is an app which allows the user to take photos of receipts, business cards, sticky notes, or even whiteboards, and then post-editing it within the app to turn the captured image into a workable digital file. It automatically crops, adjusts, enhances and cleans up the image before saving the file in OneNote.
Besides that, the app uses optical character recognition (OCR) to identify printed text, allowing the user to search for the image file by keywords in OneNote. Not only can it create digital copies of documents, it can also convert these images into Word documents, PowerPoint presentations or even PDF files for further editing and reformatting. Additionally, the app even has the function to create a new contact should the image captured be a business card.
Nonetheless, Office Lens is not something new as similar document scanning apps already exist – such as CamScanner, Scanbot and TinyScan Pro. The app is more of an added feature to expand Microsoft’s note-taking app, OneNote’s capture capabilities.
The app is now available for free on the App Store. On Android, the app is still in a preview version. Those interested can try out Office Lens for Android by becoming a tester.
[Source: Office Blogs]
