Optimizing Nepali PDF Extraction: A Comparative Study of Parser and OCR Technologies

Abstract: This research compares PDF parsing and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) methods for extracting Nepali content from PDFs. PDF parsing offers fast and accurate extraction but faces challenges with non-Unicode Nepali fonts. OCR, specifically PyTesseract, overcomes these challenges, providing versatility for both digital and scanned PDFs. The study reveals that while PDF parsers are faster, their accuracy fluctuates based on PDF types. In contrast, OCRs, with a focus on PyTesseract, demonstrate consistent accuracy at the expense of slightly longer extraction times. Considering the project's emphasis on Nepali PDFs, PyTesseract emerges as the most suitable library, balancing extraction speed and accuracy.