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Here's the answer folks. I thought it might be something like this.
Thank you Pat!
PLB
Reply to: RE>>Fax Machines
Paul Beck asks:
>Why would I need an Optical Character
>Reader (OCR) (read-extra) program to read a file that is stored in my
>computer
>on the hard disk in a file. This is fishy. There are no optics involved.
(...)
> Now wait a
>minute! If the file can be read by a PostScript printer then it should be
>readable by a word processor, shouldn't it?
Fax modems create a file transferable to other fax machines by turning it into
a bitmap.
When you receive a fax on your fax modem, you are receiving a bitmap. When you
send a received fax to a PostScript printer, you are sending it a bitmap of the
page. You could take it in to some word processors as a picture, but you can't
edit it the way you would text.
In order to have it as real text instead of a bitmap, you either (a) retype it
or (b) use OCR software.
Benefits besides editability? Depending on the level of compression your fax
modem uses, a text file might take up less space.
