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Abstract

A document search system provides a user with a programming interface for dynamically specifying features of documents recorded in a corpus of documents. The programming interface operates at a high-level that is suitable for interactive user specification of layout components and structures of documents. In operation, a bitmap image of a document is analyzed by the document search system to identify layout objects such as text blocks or graphics. Subsequently, the document search system computes a set of attributes for each of the identified layout objects. The set of attributes which are identified are used to describe the layout structure of a page image of a document in terms of the spatial relations that layout objects have to frames of reference that are defined by other layout objects. After computing attributes for each layout object, a user can operate the programming interface to define unique document features. Each document feature is a routine defined by a sequence of selections operations which consume a first set of layout objects and produce a second set of layout objects. The second set of layout objects constitutes the feature in a page image of a document. Using the programming interface, a user flexibly defines a genre of document using the user-specified document features.

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First Claim