This is from the fax thread. I am proposing to turn a number of existing utilities into self contained agents that will be started by the Synapse server, and will terminate when the same Synapse server terminates. The candidates are: an agent that scans a directory and imports the files into the fax inbox an agent that ocrs all the files that are added an agent that uploads the cache listener, and the remr backup files to Amazon S3 for backup an agent that synchronizes the patients in Synapse with Medisoft an agent that scans a directory and imports the files to an inbox assigning them to a dummy patient. These can then be allocated to the correct patient and doc. These will go by the name of Synapse Server Agents ( as opposed to Matrix Agents )
That sounds exciting. With most EHRs, file import (such as scanned in consultant or imaging reports) can be a pain. With the above mentioned agents, we could speed up the process quite a bit. I love the ability of Synapse to attach Metadata ("CXR normal"). I am not aware of any EHR with this functionality. I care about this even more since I do not have a secretary that does all this clerical work for me. Automated backup is already available for Firebird but automated backup to an online facility is even better. Most EHR companies charge lots of money to provide this service themselves. So, we've got a bunch of Synapse agents and Amazones fighting for us. Sounds epic. Marius
This is the Synapse approach .. you either hire another 10 programmers to get the benefit of a single monolithic approach as used by the traditional EHRs, or, you work smarter and leverage existing robust web services.
FAXQ Agent Monitors a directory and inserts these documents into the incoming faxbox. The documents are of *.tif, *.tiff, *.g3, and *.pdf format only. The filename ( excluding the file extension ) will be taken as the sender of the fax The timestamp on the file will be taken as the date/time when the fax was received. So, say we had a directory c:\faxq\ and a file c:\faxq\123432432.pdf then the sender will be 123432432 ie. the originating fax number.
Hylafax Agent Will poll a Cheyenne Hylafax server, download all new faxes and save them to the faxq table which is the Inbox/fax .
Graham, In your view, would the new Server Agents come close to severely reducing or eliminating the need for an application like Paperport for "ad hoc" scan/fax/digital paper/file storage for a particular patient? I guess as long as one uses synapse to "index and find" scan/fax files, one could have a gi-normous faxq folder and/or synapse-server cache-listener folder. I think the disadvange would be that you couldn't just wipe out all the files in faxq to get rid of the digital flotsam anymore.
Jerry The faxq folder is temporary - these files are moved to the patient's results tables ( and then appear in the cache-listener ). And you can still choose to delete them from the results which removes the files. I don't think paperport is necessary - I would move instead to using a local Deki server for storing files if you need them .. because you can then open up these files to a patient if needed.
Beta testers - please download and install Imagemagick on your server. Imagemagick will be used to convert compressed tifs, and pdfs to uncompressed tif prior to OCR. I have OCR working now ..just testing it.
Here's the imagemagick download link http://www.imagemagick.org/download/binaries/ImageMagick-6.4.6-6-Q16-windows-static.exe
FaxQ Agent with OCR Upgrade your current Synapse-Server to 23 - this will download and "install tesseract" for OCR. Now shut down Synapse-Server, and wait for FaxQ to close down, or remove it using the systray menu If you have faxq.exe, delete it Restart Synapse-Server, and this will download the latest FaxQ.exe agent All documents will now be OCR'd using tesseract and included with the faxed document in your Inbox/Faxes tab Note that all pdfs, tiffs are converted to uncompressed tif format by imagemagick so that it can be ocr'd by tesseract. This is very processor intensive ... but worth it!
Oh yeah ... this is only a first pass .. don't expect it work 100% Because of the limited OCR abilities of Tesseract, I would prefer to switch to using the web service ...
[quote user="Graham"] Here's the imagemagick download link http://www.imagemagick.org/download/binaries/ImageMagick-6.4.6-6-Q16-windows-static.exe [/quote] They are up to 6.4.6-8 now, so what works now is http://www.imagemagick.org/download/binaries/ImageMagick-6.4.6-8-Q16-windows-static.exe
[quote user="Graham"] Here's the imagemagick download link http://www.imagemagick.org/download/binaries/ImageMagick-6.4.6-6-Q16-windows-static.exe [/quote] Thanks. Here are the new links. I take it the 16bit Win32 is the one I need. <table cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" id="table" style="width: 93%"><tbody><tr><td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-10-Q16-windows-dll.exe</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">Win32 dynamic at 16 bits-per-pixel</td> </tr> <tr> <td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-10-Q16-windows-static.exe</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">Win32 static at 16 bits-per-pixel</td> </tr> <tr> <td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-10-Q16-windows-x64-static.exe</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">x64 static at 16 bits-per-pixel</td> </tr> <tr> <td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-10-Q8-windows-dll.exe</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">Win32 dynamic at 8 bits-per-pixel</td> </tr> <tr> <td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-10-Q8-windows-static.exe</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">Win32 static at 8 bits-per-pixel</td> </tr> <tr> <td valign="top">ImageMagick-6.4.8-Q16-windows.zip</td> <td valign="top"></td> <td valign="top">download</td> <td valign="top">Portable Win32 static at 16 bits-per-pixel. This distribution does not include an installer and is most useful if you want to include ImageMagick in your own application distribution</td></tr></tbody></table>
Here's a direct quote from the ImageMagick website: The Windows version of ImageMagick is self-installing. Simply click on the appropriate version below and it will launch itself and ask you a few installation questions. Versions with Q8 in the name are 8 bits-per-pixel component (e.g. 8-bit red, 8-bit green, etc.), whereas, Q16 in the filename are 16 bits-per-pixel component. A Q16 version permits you to read or write 16-bit images without losing precision but requires twice as much resources as the Q8 version. Versions with dll in the filename include ImageMagick libraries as dynamic link libraries. If you are not sure which version is appropriate, choose ImageMagick-6.4.9-1-Q16-windows-dll.exe.
The Synapse client downloads and installs the dll version as it needs the dll. But the server doesn't use the DLL .. so either version will work there.
I'm not getting very good results with Tesseract OCR. What happens currently is that files ( faxes, pdfs etc ) in the fax directory are imported into the fax inbox. The file is ocr'd by Tesseract, and that is associated with the file. But the file is also OCR'd by the OCR web service if you are running it .... So, I have added a new button that allows you to transfer the OCR results from the web service to the fax inbox ...
