Data Capture

Before legacy data can be reused for new business applications, the data must be captured.  At the Piper Group, we have significant experience of data capture and conversion techniques for large corporates.

Legacy data usually comes as hard copy, as traditional electronic documentation (i.e. as a MS Word or FrameMaker file) or as markup language files (typically SGML or XML).  Where a document is in hard copy format it will be scanned and captured by optical character recognition (OCR), thereby creating the raw material for subsequent electronic manipulation such as script conversion to create SGML-tagged data.

If data is already in an electronic form, electronic conversion is undertaken using scripting to convert the source files into SGML.  The data will then be in a versatile common-source format ready for further use.

The conversion of legacy data isn’t restricted to text documents.  Graphical capture and conversion is also possible, enabling existing graphic resources to find a new lease of life on the Web or in an ITD (interactive technical document).  Innovative Piper Group products, such as our IsoDraw Hotspotting Plugin tool, can capture legacy graphics and turn them into powerful tools to navigate your data (for instance, spares information) in a Web-based environment.