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PowerOCR Module

doc/dsc/modules/PowerOCR.md

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PowerOCR Module

Synopsis

Manages configuration for the Power OCR (Text Extractor) utility, which extracts text from images and screen regions.

Description

The PowerOCR module configures PowerToys Power OCR (Text Extractor), a utility that uses optical character recognition (OCR) to extract text from any screen region and copy it to the clipboard. It's useful for capturing text from images, videos, PDFs, or any on-screen content.

Properties

The PowerOCR module supports the following configurable properties:

ActivationShortcut

Sets the keyboard shortcut to activate text extraction.

Type: object
Properties:

  • win (boolean) - Windows key modifier
  • ctrl (boolean) - Ctrl key modifier
  • alt (boolean) - Alt key modifier
  • shift (boolean) - Shift key modifier
  • code (integer) - Virtual key code
  • key (string) - Key name

Default: Win+Shift+T

PreferredLanguage

Sets the preferred language for OCR recognition.

Type: string
Default: System language

Examples

Example 1 - Configure activation shortcut with direct execution

This example customizes the OCR activation shortcut.

powershell
$config = @{
    settings = @{
        properties = @{
            ActivationShortcut = @{
                win = $true
                ctrl = $false
                alt = $false
                shift = $true
                code = 84
                key = "T"
            }
        }
        name = "PowerOCR"
        version = "1.0"
    }
} | ConvertTo-Json -Depth 10 -Compress

PowerToys.DSC.exe set --resource 'settings' --module PowerOCR `
    --input $config

Example 2 - Configure language with DSC

This example sets the preferred OCR language.

bash
dsc config set --file powerocr-language.dsc.yaml
yaml
# powerocr-language.dsc.yaml
$schema: https://aka.ms/dsc/schemas/v3/bundled/config/document.json
resources:
  - name: Configure Power OCR language
    type: Microsoft.PowerToys/PowerOCRSettings
    properties:
      settings:
        properties:
          PreferredLanguage: en-US
        name: PowerOCR
        version: 1.0

Example 3 - Install and configure with WinGet

This example installs PowerToys and configures Power OCR.

bash
winget configure winget-powerocr.yaml
yaml
# winget-powerocr.yaml
$schema: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/PowerShell/DSC/main/schemas/2023/08/config/document.json
metadata:
  winget:
    processor: dscv3
resources:
  - name: Install PowerToys
    type: Microsoft.WinGet.DSC/WinGetPackage
    properties:
      id: Microsoft.PowerToys
      source: winget
  
  - name: Configure Power OCR
    type: Microsoft.PowerToys/PowerOCRSettings
    properties:
      settings:
        properties:
          PreferredLanguage: en-US
        name: PowerOCR
        version: 1.0

Example 4 - Multilingual configuration

This example configures for multilingual text extraction.

bash
dsc config set --file powerocr-multilingual.dsc.yaml
yaml
# powerocr-multilingual.dsc.yaml
$schema: https://aka.ms/dsc/schemas/v3/bundled/config/document.json
resources:
  - name: Multilingual OCR
    type: Microsoft.PowerToys/PowerOCRSettings
    properties:
      settings:
        properties:
          PreferredLanguage: fr-FR
        name: PowerOCR
        version: 1.0

Use cases

Document digitization

Configure for extracting text from documents:

yaml
resources:
  - name: Document OCR
    type: Microsoft.PowerToys/PowerOCRSettings
    properties:
      settings:
        properties:
          PreferredLanguage: en-US
        name: PowerOCR
        version: 1.0

International content

Configure for multilingual content extraction:

yaml
resources:
  - name: Multilingual OCR
    type: Microsoft.PowerToys/PowerOCRSettings
    properties:
      settings:
        properties:
          PreferredLanguage: es-ES
        name: PowerOCR
        version: 1.0

See also

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