Document Management – Glossary – O

Home > Resources > Document Management – Glossary > Document Management – Glossary – O

OAIS Open Archive Information System.  Standards for digital archiving.  Used with document management and email archiving solutions.

Object Oriented Programming See OOP

OCR Optical Character Recognition.  A Technique for analyzing bitmap images and recognizing and translating the  alphanumeric characters into machine-readable text.   OCR may be utilized for converting an image to an editable word processing document.  OCR is also commonly used for establishing a collection of words from a page for purposes of populating the searchable database of a document management system.  Zonal OCR technology is also utilized for converting only specific portions of an image and populating specific meta data fields.

ODA Open Document Architecture. Open Document Architecture and ODIF (Open Document Interchange Format) are standards to facilitate the storage and interchange of documents in formatted processable formats.

ODBC Open Database Connectivity standard for linking client workstation with server database.  This is commonly used with document management systems for pulling pre-existing meta data from a line of business application and populating the meta data fields of the DMS software.

Off-line Storage classification that requires users to perform a manual action to access information. Thus information stored on a magnetic tape or disk not directly accessible by a computer is considered to be off-line.  Document management systems, in the past, have had off-line storage of images on removable disk, such as CD or DVD. With the low cost of storage and cloud storage options, off-line storage is being used less.

Office Open XML (OOXML) A Microsoft-developed format for office documents based on XML. An alternative to PDF/A and Open Document formats for long-term preservation.  Most popular document management systems have migrated toward PDF as the standard document format for files converted from paper to image.  PDF/A is the more dominate format for the industry.

OLE Object Linking and Embedding. A Microsoft standard for processing compound documents.

OMR Optical Mark Reading. A recognition technology for detecting the presence or absence of marks in a defined space,  e.g. ticks or crosses in boxes, etc.  Commonly used for reading darkened circles, squares, etc. for purposes of generating meta data values for document s being added to a document management system.

Online Storage of information is directly accessible by a software program, without manual intervention. Thus information stored on a hard disk is considered to be online.

OOP Object Oriented Program. Application in which data and the means to process it are stored together. The combination  of data and processes creates an object. Fully defined objects can be linked together to form applications without further programming.

Open Doc Rival to OLE supported by Apple and IBM.

Open Document An open standard format for office documents based on XML. An alternative to PDF/A and OOXML for long-term preservation.

Open Document Architecture See ODA

Open Source A program in which the source code is available to the general public for use and/or modification from its original design free of charge.

Open Systems Interconnect See OSI

Optical Character Recognition See OCR

Optical disk  A disk coated with a recording medium on which binary information is recorded and read using a laser. Abbreviated as OD. See also erasable disk, WORM

OSI Open Systems Interconnect. Set of interface standards promoted by ISO and aimed at allowing the exchange of information between computers, networks and applications.

Output device  A device by which a computer presents data in human readable form, e.g. displays and printers