1 Declutter your desk

Got a desk covered with documents, business cards, receipts, and other types of clutter? Use DocScanner to declutter it. How? It’s simple, as DocScanner can tell the difference between document types. In addition, it can auto-sort the documents to separate folders by their type. Just scan all the documents that clutter your beautiful desk! Now with digitized copies of your papers, you can trash the clutter if you want with no worries.

2 Make your scanned documents searchable

DocScanner creates PDF documents by pasting the scan result as an image to the document. To make the document text copyable and searchable, DocScanner comes with a handy OCR feature. Use the OCR to transform the PDF into plain text. Having the document as plain text makes it possible to copy & paste it to any iOS app, such as Gmail, Mailbox, or Notes. The extracted text is attached to the PDF as metadata, making the document searchable in any environment.

3 Share your documents in the cloud

DocScanner can upload scanned documents to Evernote, Dropbox, and Google Drive. By storing your scanned documents to a cloud storage service, it’s easy to access them virtually from anywhere with an internet connection. If you want to share your documents, you can easily allow access to the cloud folder where your documents are located.

The DocScanner app is well known for its productivity increasing features that can save you a great deal of time. Designed to scan & archive your documents with just a single tap, we listed here five key ways on how to improve your productivity with DocScanner.

#1 Let DocScanner take care of all the adjustments

Most scanner apps prompt the user to adjust the document after scanning – drag corners, correct white balance, rotate document – all that stuff. DocScanner, however, does all the adjustments for you. No need for time consuming manual adjusting. Just place the document on an even surface, tap once, and let DocScanner take care of the rest.

#2 Batch scan & sort documents using DocScanner’s auto-sort feature

Time to unclutter your desk covered with all kinds documents, receipts, and biz cards? Storing different types of documents to different cloud storage services? Then make use of the auto-sort feature. With auto-sort, DocScanner can tell the difference between a document, business card, receipt, and a whiteboard. Additionally, you can set different document types to be uploaded to different folders or different cloud storage services. See the auto-sort in use with Evernote on this Youtube video.

#3 Tap once to scan & auto-upload documents to the cloud

Set DocScanner to auto-upload documents to cloud storage services the moment they are scanned. See Youtube video tutorials for Evernote, Dropbox, and Google Drive.

#4 Use DocScanner’s OCR ability to convert documents to plain text, and to make their content searchable

As you may know, DocScanner comes with an Optical Character Recognition (OCR) ability as a standard. Use the OCR feature to convert documents to plain text. Once the OCR has extracted the text, it is pasted to the PDF document as metadata. This way you can make your documents searchable on your iDevice, and on any laptop or PC. See a document being OCR’d on an iPad in this Youtube video.

#5 Sync DocScanner documents between iOS devices through iCloud

Since the release of DocScanner 6 iOS, there’s been a possibility for iCloud syncing between iOS devices. If you happen to be a proud owner of both an iPhone and an iPad, you can have your DocScanner documents available on both your devices. Just turn the iCloud on in the Settings menu. Once switched on, all your documents are backed up in the iCloud. The iCloud can also save the day, and your documents, when installing DocScanner to a new iDevice, or when doing a re-install.

DocScanner S Settings Menu Walkthrough

Switch between PDF and JPG scanning modes.

View all DocScanner S video tutorials here, http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLa4JfDujSWmW7XS8Er_-UiKwzFcCEG6mb

In this previous blog post and in this Youtube video, we introduced how to manage receipts effectively with DocScanner & Evernote. Since then, we have launched a new app that’s solely designed for receipt management & expense tracking. Yep, that’s Piikki.

Similar to the DocScanner app, you will use the device camera to snap photos of receipts with Piikki. Then what happens after that is a bit different. For expense tracking, you can enter the receipt total and choose a category for your receipt. Make a habbit of storing your receipts to Piikki, and you can have Piikki visualize your spending with graphs! See your spending easily on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis.

As in DocScanner, Piikki saves all scanned documents to the In-App file manager. If the GPS geolocation is activated on your iPhone, Piikki names each receipt after the nearest street address, including the city name. With geolocation switched on, it’s easy to search for receipts photographed in a certain place, lets say New York or Los Angeles. You can also categorize and tag your receipts as you like.

Need to send your receipts to someone? Piikki has a built-in email template you can pre-configure with recipient address, subject, and message. Waste no time by typing each email separately. For cloud uploads, Piikki connects with Evernote, Dropbox, and Google Drive. In Piikki, there are plenty of ways to send receipts back home when on the road. No more scanning a bunch of receipts at the end of a trip!

A popular personal finance app, Piikki is a TOP 10 app in its category on the US App Store. Try it and be amazed how easy it is to manage your receipts and expenses with it!

Here’s what being said about Piikki in the media…

“Receipts are ridiculously easy to lose, so I always try to snap a picture of important ones with my phone. From now on, I’ll be taking those pictures with Piikki.” -Lifehacker

“I love the way it finds the receipt in the camera’s frame and auto snaps and crops it. I also like that it sends the results straight up to Evernote.” -Cult of Mac

“The app also integrates with Dropbox, Google Drive, and Evernote, meaning you can easily archive receipts to the cloud service of your choice, then share them with accounts payable or your tax guy.” -Macworld

“The best part about Piikki is being able to see what money is being spent on, how much, and how often.” -MacTrast

“Keeping track of receipts and expenses is a very important thing and this app makes it very easy.” -appPicker

Download Piikki on the App Store.

During the past 30 days, we published a series of blog posts and video tutorials on cloud storage services - Evernote, Dropbox, and Google Drive – and how to link them to the DocScanner app. In the mobile era, cloud storage has become the standard for storing files and transferring them between devices and users. We listed here five top reasons why you should use one.

1 Access your documents anywhere

The main advantage of keeping your documents in the cloud is that you can access them virtually anywhere with an internet connection. All cloud storage services have their own apps you can install on your mobile device. Most cloud storage services can also be used via browser, so accessing your files on a laptop or PC should be as fast and convenient as with your mobile device. Browser access can also be great for situations where you need to access your files using a device other than your own.

2 Share your documents easily

In addition to being able to access your documents anywhere, sharing is another important reason to use a cloud service. Usually, the person you decide to share a file or a folder with needs to be a user of that same cloud storage service. Whether it’s lecture materials or work documents, sharing in the cloud is super easy & fast!

3 Keep your documents safe

Mobile devices can get broken or lost quite easily. Using a cloud storage as a depository for your files ensures they are safe should your device get broken or lost. When using cloud storage services with DocScanner, you can set DocScanner to auto-upload your documents to the cloud. This way you can keep all your DocScanner documents safe. DocScanner also supports iCloud. Upload your DocScanner documents to the iCloud, and make them available on all your iOS devices. The iCloud can also recover your documents when installing DocScanner on a new device, or when doing a re-install.

4 Get cloud storage space for free or at very low cost

Almost all cloud storage services operate on the freemium model, where you get a certain amount of space free of charge, and more when you pay. At the moment, premium subscription for Evernote gives you 1 GB of monthly uploads and costs only five dollars per month. Even if you decide to go for the free plan, you still get 60 MB of monthly uploads – still enough for dozens of documents. A 100 GB subscription to Dropbox costs $99 per year, or $8.25 per month, and basically gives you a second hard drive. If you don’t need that much, you can still have 2 GB for free.

5 Accumulate a personal file archive in the cloud you can use in different occasions

Showing photos to your friends & relatives? Sharing lecture materials with other students at school? Storing receipts in the cloud for accounting? Why not to accumulate a personal archive in the cloud you can access anywhere, anytime? Use different cloud services for different purposes. Upload documents and receipts to Evernote, share photos on Dropbox, and collaborate on office documents on Google Drive.

Read more

Extend Your DocScanner with Evernote, Dropbox, Google Drive, and iCloud

How to Digitize & Share Handouts and Lecture Notes with Ease?

How To Manage Receipts Effectively With DocScanner And Evernote

5 Reasons Why Digital Is Better Than Paper

Video Tutorial: How to Connect Evernote with DocScanner & Set Document Auto-Upload

Video Tutorial: How to Connect Google Drive with DocScanner & Set Document Auto-Upload

A Google cloud integration has existed in DocScanner ever since 2010. That’s when the Google Docs was introduced to the app. Since then, Google Docs has evolved from an online office suite into Google Drive, a full-featured cloud file storage and synchronization service. Offering 5 GB of free online storage, and more if you pay, Google Drive is a considerable alternative as a cloud storage for your files.

Knowing this, we shot this video tutorial showing how to connect Google Drive with DocScanner. We also set DocScanner to auto-upload scanned documents to Google Drive. This way, you can upload all the documents you scan automatically to your selected folder on Google Drive, and make your life run smoother.

After trade shows, seminars, and business meetings you usually have a handful of business cards from new people you have just met. Now what do you do with the cards? Maybe you put them in your rolodex, or photograph them with your iPhone using some business card manager app. How about if you could learn more about a person than it says on the card?

Well, now you can. The latest app from the DocScanner team, the ScifiScanner shows profile information from social networks when saving business cards on the phone. After photographing a business card with ScifiScanner, the app shows you profile photos and other information it has found about the person on social networks. All this extra information is stored with the card.

The app saves all the card images & contact information to its own in-app file manager, where they can be sorted & searched. For those wanting to export the saved contact information, ScifiScanner connects with Google Contacts.

All in all, ScifiScanner is a refreshing idea on how the social dimension can be brought to a business card scanner & contact management app. Download ScifiScanner on the App Store here!

DocScanner has been a longtime friend of Evernote, a cloud-based note taking & archiving service. In this 1½ minute video tutorial, we demo with the latest version of DocScanner iOS, the v6.0.12, on how to link Evernote with DocScanner, and how to set DocScanner to auto-upload documents to Evernote.

For those unfamiliar with Evernote, it’s a cloud service that allows the user to create, upload, tag, and search notes & documents. Many DocScanner users use Evernote as a depository for their documents they have created with DocScanner. If a user has OCR’d or tagged a document in DocScanner, the extracted text and tags will transfer to Evernote with the document, making them extremely searchable.

The DocScanner app can transform your iPhone into a handheld portable scanner in just seconds. But what other real world items than a scanner your iPhone can substitute? We listed here a handful of apps that can easily substitute, or even replace real items when installed on the iPhone.

Flashlight.*. Ever since iPhone 4, Apple has included a powerful LED flash on the back of each iPhone, next to the camera lens. The flash also couples as a flashlight, as the LED can emit light continuously. To activate continuous lighting, you’ll need an app called “Flashlight.*” by Apptures. Now there are many flashlight apps out there, but we chose this for its simplicity.

Get Flashlight.* on the App Store - https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/flashlight.*/id404181268?mt=8

Thermometer. Still peeking on the outside thermometer to see how hot or cold it is? Well, install the Thermometer app by Presselite in your iPhone, and you can see the outside temperature anywhere. While not exactly a real thermometer, as the iPhone doesn’t have a thermal sensor, Thermometer uses the phone geolocation and weather service data to determine the temperature.

Get Thermometer on the App Store - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/thermometer/id357949214?mt=8

645 PRO. While the iPhone’s own camera app is just great for snapping pictures, sometimes it would be nice to have the same settings available that you have in your SLR. Here’s where the 645 PRO app by Michael Hardaker comes in the picture. The 645 PRO basically makes your iPhone a DSLR. It has many adjustments you can find only in real SLRs and DSLRs – like auto-focus lock and auto-exposure lock. The 645 PRO also has a collection of different virtual lenses and films to choose from.

Get 645 PRO on the App Store - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/645-pro/id518235205?mt=8

iHandy Level. Wish to check if a shelf or a painting is aligned straight, but don’t trust your eyes to do that? The iHandy Level app by iHandy Inc. solves it. Part of a 5 piece carpenter app collection, it’s simply a level in your iPhone.

Get iHandy Level on the App Store - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ihandy-level-free/id299852753?mt=8

TrueMetronome. Are you learning to play an instrument? Are you a musician? Then you might find the TrueMetronome app useful. Having all the features that a classic metronome has, the TrueMetronome app is a considerable substitute for the real one.

Get TrueMetronome on the App Store - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/truemetronome/id574204413?mt=8

USB Disk. Still carry a USB stick with you? Convert your iPhone into a USB drive with the USB Disk app. Plug in your iPhone just like a normal USB drive into your Mac using the iPhone USB cable.

Get USB Disk on the App Store – https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/usb-disk/id370531520?mt=8

edjing. edjing is a dual turntable on your iPhone. Couple the edjing app with a wireless AirPlay speaker, and you’ll have a portable DJ setup! Import songs from iTunes song library to edjing. Use the turntable to scratch songs like a real DJ.

Get edging on the App Store – https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/edjing-dj-turntables-songs/id493226494?mt=8

DocScanner. Need an app to convert paper documents to PDFs? DocScanner is the original scanner app for iPhone & iPad. Known for its matchless image quality, DocScanner creates PDF documents in a snap. The most complete scanner app in the market, DocScanner comes with built-in OCR with 36 languages, AirPrint support, iCloud sync, and auto-upload to cloud storage services such as Evernote, Dropbox, and Google Drive. It’s practically a scanner in your pocket. Get DocScanner on the App Store – https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/docscanner-scan-multipage/id312391317?mt=8

The DocScanner iOS app was recently updated with a new user interface theme. With the introduction of this new, darker theme, DocScanner makes a partial return to its original, darkened appearance.

The v6.0.11 update also makes page counts visible in the document manager, if a document has more than one page. The page count is displayed stylishly in a circle on the top of each multi-page document, allowing the user to quickly & easily see the page count.