For scanning papers, we have a series of recommendations to ensure high quality. Donated PDFs, however, come in a range of qualities. While having any scan of a paper is better than no scan at all, we would like to have the best and most complete scans possible. To track PDF quality, we rate them on the following attributes. (Examples are given below the listing.)
- Text completeness (refers to presence of entire pages in the document, not whether some pages are only partially visible [see Text scan quality])
- 0. Completeness unknown
- 1. Mostly incomplete
- 2. Mostly complete
- 3. Text is complete
- Plate/figure completeness (refers to presence of entire pages in the document, not whether some images are only partially visible [see Plate/figure scan quality])
- 0. Completeness unknown
- 1. Mostly incomplete
- 2. Mostly complete
- 3. Plates are complete (or original document has no plates)
- Text scan quality (see examples below)
- 0. Text scan quality unknown
- 1. Very poor, parts unreadable
- 2. Largely readable, but some dropouts and probably poor OCR
- 3. All readable, but not clear enough to guarantee excellent OCR
- 4. All readable and clearly scanned at high resolution
- 5. “Native” PDF, not a scan, so perfectly clear
- Plate/figure scan quality (see examples below)
- 0. Plate/figure scan quality unknown
- 1. Very poor, barely visible
- 2. Useful images, but much detail lost
- 3. Well-scanned, but not full resolution; color lost
- 4. Clear high-resolution scan; color retained
- 5. “Native” PDF, not a scan, so figures are completely original quality (or there are no figures/plates in the original document, so they're perfect by definition!)
Quality Examples
Text scan quality
| Rating | Example (screen capture from PDF) |
|---|
| 0. Text scan quality unknown | (no example) |
| 1. Very poor, parts unreadable |  |
| 2. Largely readable, but some dropouts and probably poor OCR |  |
| 3. All readable, but not clear enough to guarantee excellent OCR |  |
| 4. All readable and clearly scanned at high resolution |  |
| 5. “Native” PDF, not a scan, so perfectly clear |  |
Plate/figure scan quality
| Rating | Example (screen capture from PDF) |
|---|
| 0. Plate/figure scan quality unknown | (no example) |
| 1. Very poor, barely visible |  |
| 2. Useful images, but much detail lost |  |
| 3. Well-scanned, but not full resolution; color lost |  |
| 4. Clear high-resolution scan; color retained |  |
| 5. No Plates or “Native” PDF, not a scan, so figures are completely original quality (or there are no figures/plates in the original document, so they're perfect by definition!) | (no example) |