MODI Microsoft Document Imaging Reader

If you are in the market for a Microsoft Document Imaging Reader I am afraid your options are essentially limited to its native application, MODI. MODI stands for Microsoft Office Document Imaging and is the document imaging reader and creator included in modern versions of MS Office. You can also create and open TIFF based document images with MODI, this a possible solution if you have access to MS Office is to use MODI to covert the file into the more portable TIFF. If you require your file to be used on a handheld or portable device such as Pocket PC or Palm this is about your only option. There currently is no native way to open MDI files in Pocket PC.

Microsoft Office Document Imaging (MODI) was first introduced in Microsoft Office XP and is included in later versions of Office including Office 2003 and Office 2007. According to Microsoft, MODI allows users to: Scan single or multipage documents. Produce editable text from a scanned document using OCR (Optical Character Recognition). Copy and export scanned text and images to MS Word. View a scanned document. Search for text within a scanned document. Easily reorganize scanned document pages. Send scanned documents via email or fax. And annotate scanned documents including using ink on a Tablet PC.

MODI can also save OCR text into the original TIFF file, although the text appears to be accessible only through the Microsoft Document Imaging Reader. The text is also visible in a binary editor, for those so inclined. In its default mode, the OCR engine will re-orient the page where required. If the objectname.save method is called it will save the reoriented images back into the original image file.

Although the program was introduced in Office XP, some have pointed out its similarities with the Xerox authored document imaging app that was once bundled with Windows 98 and 2000. The program bears a strong resemblance to this twenty year old program. Another sign that it may in fact be an updated version of this program is the fact that it has a very simple interface and runs incredibly well on modern hardware, a sign that it may have been intended originally for more modest computing hardware. This has made the program a favorite of those who want a simple Microsoft Document Imaging Reader or TIFF Reader. Such simplicity and fast performance has become rare in modern Microsoft products.