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OCR and the Welsh Language. Lyn Léwis Dafis and Martin Locock 2007-07-20. Welsh orthography Digraphs and diacritics Scanning for OCR Books From The Past Welsh Journals Online. Welsh orthography. Old Welsh 7th century Poets of the nobility 1588/1620 Bible
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OCR and the Welsh Language Lyn Léwis Dafis and Martin Locock 2007-07-20
Welsh orthography • Digraphs and diacritics • Scanning for OCR • Books From The Past • Welsh Journals Online
Welsh orthography • Old Welsh 7th century • Poets of the nobility • 1588/1620 Bible • William Owen Pughe, Welsh and English dictionary 1803 • Welsh orthography 1893 • Orgraff yr iaith Gymraeg 1928
Digraphs and diacritics • Digraphsch dd ff ng ll ph rh th • DiacriticsÂ Ê Î Ô Û Ŵ Ŷ â ê î ô ûŵŷÄ Ë Ï Ö Ü Ẅ Ÿ ä ë ï ö ü ẅ ÿÀ È Ì Ò Ù Ẁ Ỳ à è ì ò ù ẁ ỳÁ É Í Ó Ú Ẃ Ý á é í ó ú ẃ ý
Digraphs and diacritics • Digraphsch dd ff ng ll ph rh th • DiacriticsÂ Ê Î Ô Û Ŵ Ŷ â ê î ô ûŵŷÄ Ë Ï Ö Ü Ẅ Ÿ ä ë ï ö ü ẅ ÿÀ È Ì Ò Ù Ẁ Ỳ à è ì ò ù ẁ ỳÁ É Í Ó Ú Ẃ Ý á é í ó ú ẃ ý
Scanning for OCR • Over 300 dpi • Grayscale and not bi-tonal
Books from the Past • 19th-early 20th C printed texts (novels, sermons, poetry) • Wanted clean TEI text to accompany scans • Required OCR contractor to identify diacritics • TEI cleaned by hand • Most diacritics incorrect • Need Welsh dictionary to check % words identified
Searching Ignore? impractical Could be key in the future Stop words Display of TEI dy dy‘your your’ dy dŷ ‘your house’ ei dwr | ei dwrei thwr | ei thwrei dŵr | ei dwr ei thŵr| ei thwr Is it essential?
Normalise to unaccented form > TEI is incorrect; Display is ok Need to handle searching Or identify where possible Silent fuzzy searching (lookup table) OR ‘Did you mean’ Welsh Journals Online20th C texts; scan is main presentation format; 40% Welsh; English and Welsh user interfaces; content tagged for language
Further information Lyn Léwis Dafis Pennaeth yr uned ddigido a metadata Head of the digitisation and metadata unit lvd@llgc.org.uk Martin Locock Rheolwr Prosiect Cylchgronau Cymru Welsh Journals Online project manager martin.locock@llgc.org.uk