Nuance PaperPort 12

Nuance PaperPort 12 the world’s favorite document management software for the PC, is the fastest and easiest way for home users to scan, organize, find and share documents and photos. It combines the power of document scanning services, the efficiency of digital desktop organization and search, and the convenience of high-quality PDF document creation, assembly and sharing in one easy-to-use application. Eliminate paper clutter, go green and organize your home office once and for all with PaperPort 12. You’ll wonder how you ever managed without..

PaperPort works with most scanners and lets you create PDF documents, or print to PDF, meaning you don't need to buy Adobe Acrobat creation software. The PaperPort desktop looks like Windows Explorer, with thumbnails of each document. Like Microsoft Office 2007, PaperPort 12 has a collapsible features ribbon at the top. Click on any thumbnail and you read the document. Jeff Segarra, senior product manager for PaperPort, says searching of the text within PDFs is much improved and the indexed information can be used with Windows search; it already works with Google Desktop search. It also works with other document formats and with photos, although if you've got thousands of photos, something photo specific such as Picassa or Adobe Photoshop Elements makes more sense.

The most enhanced feature may be forms and forms-fill. Drag a document to PaperPort's typewriter icon and it finds all the blanks you need to fill in. Now it does things such as recognize check boxes and makes them radio button check items with your choice of character (check mark, X, bullet, etcetera) but it doesn't, unfortunately, allow for multiple, check-all-that apply choices. (Manually add that.) There's a nice and simple way to add a signature and overlay that on the form; white areas become transparent when laid over the main form so the signature or other graphic doesn't look like a cut and paste. The forms can be distributed over a network or via e-mail for others to fill in. Here's one advantage that Adobe Acrobat has (Acrobat, not the free Acrobat Reader): Recipients must print out the forms and return them as paper or by fax. Only Acrobat lets you fill out and return a form electronically.

Business users get features they've been asking for such as more color tabs for the folders (29 instead of seven) and the ability to create a bunch of new folder names as a text document upload that; an indented line gives you a nested folder.

PaperPort 12 does  the same passable not perfect job as PaperPort 11 of dealing with scans from colored paper. You scan in color and use an eyedropper to mark the color that should be made white. Products such as Kofax VRS do a better job but they're too expensive for casual users unless bundled with a scanner.

PaperPort 12 still supports the proprietary MAX format that PaperPort launched with in the 1990s but this is the last version, Segarra says. There's a simple MAX to PDF converter within PaperPort.

System Requirements:

• Windows XP Vista 7
• 512 MB of free hard disk space for application files plus 20 MB working space during installation.
• SVGA monitor with 256 colors, but preferably 16-bit color (called Medium Color in XP and Vista) and at least 800 x 600 pixel resolutions.