Method and system for character recognition

1. A method in a computing system for identifying a sequence of glyphs, the method comprising:

receiving an image of a sequence of glyphs;

for each of a subset of glyphs of the sequence:

determining whether the glyph matches a retained glyph;

when the glyph matches a retained glyph, assigning to the glyph a character identity associated with the retained glyph;

when the glyph does not match a retained glyph:

retaining the glyph;

selecting a character identity for the unmatched glyph; and

assigning the selected character identity to the unmatched glyph;

generating a representation of the image of the sequence of glyphs with the assigned character identities; and

identifying the sequence of glyphs using the generated representation.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the assigned character identities relate to a geographical or ordinal position of the glyph within the sequence of glyphs.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein identifying the sequence of glyphs using the generated representation includes identifying a single sequence of glyphs from multiple possible sequences of glyphs represented by the generated representation by comparing shape information associated with the generated representation to shape information associated with the identified multiple possible sequences of glyphs.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining whether a glyph matches a retained glyph includes determining that the glyph matches a retained glyph to a certain degree of probability.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein retaining the glyph includes adding an image of the glyph to a template of glyph images.

6. A system for identifying a text sequence within an image, the system comprising:

an image reception component, wherein the image reception component is programmed to receive an image of a text sequence, the text sequence including multiple glyphs unknown to the system;

a glyph image component, wherein the glyph image component is programmed to associate an identity to a subset of the multiple glyphs based on (1) similarities in shape between the glyphs within the image of the text sequence, and (2) relative locations of the glyphs within the image of the text sequence; and

a text representation component, wherein the text representation component is programmed to generate a text representation by replacing the glyphs with the associated identities.

7. The system of claim 6 , further comprising:

a recognition component, wherein the recognition component is programmed to compare the generated text representation with a database of text representations to recognize the text sequence represented by the generated text representation.

8. The system of claim 6 , further comprising:

a match component, wherein the match component is programmed to compare the generated text representation with a database of text representations to identify two or more candidate text representations that match the generated text representation; and

a dictionary component, wherein the dictionary component is programmed to query a dictionary to assign probabilities to the candidate text representations, where the assigned probabilities are based on a relative linguistic likelihood of the candidate text representation.

9. The system of claim 6 , further comprising:

a match component, wherein the match component is programmed to compare the generated text representation with a database of text representations to identify two or more candidate text representations that match the generated text representation; and

a shape component, wherein the shape component is programmed to compare shape information associated with the generated text representation to shape information associated with the candidate text representations.