ISO 12029:2010

INTERNATIONAL ISO
STANDARD 12029
First edition
2010-08-01

Document management — Machine-
readable paper forms — Optimal design
for user friendliness and electronic
document management systems (EDMS)
Gestion de document — Formulaires papier exploitables par
machine — Conception optimale pour la facilité d'emploi et systèmes de
gestion de document électronique (EDMS)




Reference number
ISO 12029:2010(E)
©
ISO 2010

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ISO 12029:2010(E)
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
Contents Page
Foreword .iv
Introduction.v
1 Scope.1
2 Normative references.1
3 Terms and definitions .1
4 Layout and design.2
5 User guidance.8
6 Post-printing features .13
7 Materials .14
8 Form testing.15
9 Reference criteria for designing forms .15
10 New technology.16
Bibliography.17

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ISO 12029:2010(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national standards bodies
(ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally carried out through ISO
technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical committee has been
established has the right to be represented on that committee. International organizations, governmental and
non-governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in the work. ISO collaborates closely with the
International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all matters of electrotechnical standardization.
International Standards are drafted in accordance with the rules given in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2.
The main task of technical committees is to prepare International Standards. Draft International Standards
adopted by the technical committees are circulated to the member bodies for voting. Publication as an
International Standard requires approval by at least 75 % of the member bodies casting a vote.
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of patent
rights. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights.
ISO 12029 was prepared by Technical Committee ISO/TC 171, Document management applications,
Subcommittee SC 2, Application issues.
This first edition cancels and replaces ISO/TS 12029:2007, which has been technically revised.
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
Introduction
This International Standard discusses issues and provides guidance for the design of forms that are used for
electronic capture of handwriting information. Features include colour dropouts, type fonts, printing screen
tints, line width, data storage and other interrelated issues. It is necessary to balance conflicting requirements
of user-friendliness and electronic capture. Making a form appealing by use of colour or graphics could assist
users when they complete the form but could also decrease the form's scannability or other automated,
related functions. This conflict might require compromise in the design of a form.
While this International Standard focuses on the design and structure of paper-based forms, it is worth noting
that the design and structure of electronic based forms can have different characteristics, ensuring usability
and readability. The user is advised that use of these specifications when developing paper-based forms while
keeping in mind that electronic forms can be easily replicated in an electronic format (with the same content
as in the paper-based form), but with differing fonts and spacing.

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INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ISO 12029:2010(E)

Document management — Machine-readable paper forms —
Optimal design for user friendliness and electronic document
management systems (EDMS)
1 Scope
This International Standard specifies requirements concerning the design of forms for user friendliness, with
optimal machine readability for processing by electronic document management systems (EDMS). These
requirements are limited to forms using roman characters.
2 Normative references
The following referenced documents are indispensable for the application of this document. For dated
references, only the edition cited applies. For undated references, the latest edition of the referenced
document (including any amendments) applies.
ISO 1073-1, Alphanumeric character sets for optical recognition — Part 1: Character set OCR-A — Shapes
and dimensions of the printed image
ISO 1073-2, Alphanumeric character sets for optical recognition — Part 2: Character set OCR-B — Shapes
and dimensions of the printed image
ISO 12651-1, Electronic document management — Vocabulary — Part 1: Electronic document imaging
3 Terms and definitions
For the purposes of this document, the terms and definitions given in ISO 12651-1 and the following apply.
3.1
alphanumeric
pertaining to a character set that contains letters, numbers and other characters, such as punctuation marks
and symbols
NOTE Adapted from ISO/IEC 2382-4.
3.2
character pitch
number of characters per unit length of a line of print
3.3
dropout ink
ink of a colour that cannot be detected by a scanner
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
3.4
font
complete set of characters of a given size, weight and style of type, including capitals, small capitals and
lower-case characters, together with figures, punctuation marks, ligatures, etc.
NOTE Adapted from ISO/IEC 2382-23.
3.5
ICR
intelligent character recognition
advanced optical character recognition (OCR), or rather more specifically, hand-printed recognition system
that allows fonts and different styles of handwriting to be learned by a computer during processing to improve
accuracy and recognition levels
3.6
MICR
magnetic ink character recognition
machine recognition of digits printed with magnetizable ink
3.7
OMR
optical mark recognition
machine recognition of a mark such as a tick, cross or spot based on minimum area rather than shape of the
mark
[ISO 2033]
3.8
recognition zone
area around a recognition data field that is free of other data
4 Layout and design
4.1 General
The design of a form easiest for a person to complete can be in conflict with the most machine-readable form.
For example, in a user-friendly layout, the following items, all interspersed with printed instructions next to
specific areas, might be desirable:
⎯ large print,
⎯ colour-coded areas, and
⎯ areas to be completed with both alphabetic and numeric information.
However, in a form designed for an electronic image management system (EIM), strict segregation of spaces
for numeric and alphabetic information and instructional text within dropout colour areas can all be essential
features. Optimum design can require a compromise between ideal user and scanner requirements. All
logically connected information should be placed on the same page.
4.2 Data storage requirement
The designer should be aware of the impact on data storage requirements of line borders, screened tints and
logos or other design elements with large areas of reversed print. Reversed print will make heavy demands on
data storage. For all designs, particularly those having large areas of reversed print, the amount of data
storage required should be determined and compared to the amount of data storage available within the
system.
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
4.3 Page format
On each page of a form, the margin all around should not be less than 10 mm. If the document is bound,
padded or has punched holes or die cuts, the margin at that edge should be not less than 25 mm, and holes
and die cuts should be restricted to that margin.
Text and entry fields should not be within 6,5 mm of any crease or perforation.
4.4 Typeface and font
4.4.1 Typeface
There are two styles of typeface commonly used on forms, serif and sanserif, as illustrated in Figure 1.
E
E
a) Serif b) Sanserif
Figure 1 — Comparison of serif and sanserif typefaces
Serif style is designed for ease of legibility, has variable line width within a character and a cross-line finishing
a stroke of a letter. Sanserif has uniform line width within a character and no cross-lines. It is the style used in
ISO standards.
Serif type will inherently take more data storage capacity in a compressed image than sanserif type because
more information has to be recorded for each character. With the most commonly used compression
techniques, approximately 10 % more storage is required for a page printed in serif, as compared with one
printed in sanserif type.
Sanserif generally requires less horizontal line space and more vertical height than the same point size serif
type. Because of its uniform line width, it is preferred for photocopying, microfilming and scanning.
For forms which might be used in optical character recognition (OCR) applications, sanserif typefaces should
be used.
For information on a form that is not required to be captured by scanning, the style of typeface used is not
important.
4.4.2 Symbols
An OCR program can use a particular symbol to prompt an action. The form designer should be aware of any
such symbols and avoid their use other than as a prompt.
4.4.3 Spacing
In typesetting, character spacing can be either fixed or proportional. In fixed typesetting, each character takes
up equal horizontal space. Proportional typesetting allows for characters of different width, such as that of “i”
compared with “w” and automatically adjusts space between the individual characters to give a more natural
appearance.
There should be a clear gap between characters. The recommended minimum gap is not less than the width
of the vertical stroke of characters of the font.
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
The designer should also be concerned with vertical spacing requirements of an OCR system. Although
4,2 mm vertical spacing is usually sufficient for typewritten entries, at least twice that amount of space is
necessary for hand-printed entries and for separating entries for OCR.
4.4.4 Character pitch
Form design should allow no more than 0,4 characters per millimetre for character pitch.
4.4.5 Character size
In the printing industry, type size is usually specified in millimetres. In a computer or typewriter, type size is
usually indicated in points. Fortunately, the printing industry is familiar with both systems and can easily
translate requirements. The point (0,35 mm) is a unit derived from the height of metal slugs, once commonly
but now rarely, used to set type. The size of character is not directly related to point size. For a given point
size, the actual heights of the same upper-case character can be different for various typefaces. There is also
variation in the ratio of heights of lower-case “e” to upper-case characters. This means that for a given point
size, even if upper-case characters of two different typefaces have the same height, there is a possibility that
this may not be so for lower-case characters. Since it is the size of the lower-case characters that will limit
scannability, minimum acceptable point size should be determined by the height of the lower-case “e”. The
recommended minimum height of the lower-case “e” is 1,4 mm.
If the EIM system is used as a transfer medium as part of overall processing of the information extracted from
a form, the minimum type size used shall allow for any degradation of image quality resulting from subsequent
parts of the process.
4.4.6 Weight
The weight of a type font is its relative line thickness, ranging from light to extra bold. Font weight directly
affects the number of dots or pixels used to display a character of an electronic image. Different weights can
also be used to emphasize or reduce significance of text blocks or captions for the user.
4.4.7 Type family
Design variations on a basic typeface can include italic, condensed, expanded and others. Form designers
should try to keep the number of type families used within a form to a minimum to project an uncomplicated
appearance that is pleasing to the eye. EIM systems and particularly OCR software can also benefit from
limited use of type families.
4.5 Machine-printed stylized information
4.5.1 General
Information may be presented on a form as a bar code or in OCR or MICR characters. These bar codes and
stylized character sets are especially designed for automated processing and are machine readable with high
accuracy.
Machine reading is not always wholly accurate. The degree of accuracy achievable can be improved if forms
have error-checking features built into their design. Whenever possible, forms should be designed to use a
second source of information for cross checking. When calculation is involved, both subtotal and entry figures
should appear on forms so the processing system can recalculate the subtotal to compare it with the amount
read. Other examples of information for cross checking are account number/customer name, version
number/issue date.
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
4.5.2 OCR fonts
OCR fonts such as Farrington 7B, OCR-A and OCR-B are available with numeric only and alphanumeric
character sets for automated recognition. Data encoded using OCR fonts shall be printed in accordance with
the relevant International Standards listed in Table 1.
Table 1 — OCR font standards
Code types supported International Standard
OCR-A numeric ISO 1073-1
OCR-A alphanumeric ISO 1073-1
OCR-B numeric ISO 1073-2
OCR-B alphanumeric ISO 1073-2
OCR characters should be printed by a laser printer at the highest resolution whenever possible. The use of a
dot matrix printer will generally give poorer print quality and reduce the accuracy of the OCR reading. Black
characters printed on a white or light-coloured background are preferred.
OCR characters may be placed anywhere on the form, however, they should preferably be in a clearly defined
recognition zone and printed parallel to the other text. For an example of an OCR font, see Figure 2.

Figure 2 — Sample OCR code
4.5.3 MICR fonts
MICR fonts, shown in Figure 3, are limited, highly stylized character sets that are printed using magnetic ink.
Among several fonts available, E-13B and CMC-7 are the fonts frequently used on financial transaction
documents such as cheques. E-13B is highly machine readable because of its solid clear character format.
CMC-7, on the other hand, is more difficult for optical recognition because the characters are made of discrete,
thin vertical lines.

Figure 3 — Sample MICR code
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ISO 12029:2010(E)
4.5.4 Bar codes
4.5.4.1 General
Bar codes, as shown in Figure 4, may be placed anywhere on a form provided appropriate steps are taken to
protect their integrity.

Key
1 quiet zone (10×)
2 data
3 start
4 stop
5 typical data character
6 9 bits
Figure 4 — Sample bar code
4.5.4.2 Using bar codes on forms
Bar codes are commonly used as a faster, cheaper, and more accurate alternative for the capture of textual
information about an individual, a place, or thing. There are many different types of bar code symbolization
available with the choice of symbolization being applications driven.
Bar codes can be printed using most of the printing processes. They can also be applied as labels at different
stages of forms processing. When printing bar codes, the specifications governing the applicable
symbolization should be strictly followed so as to ensure that the codes will be successfully read.
Bar codes may be incorporated to automate forms-handling by representing the form number, certain fields of
the user-entered information, and possibly a control or tracking number to facilitate inventory requirements.
4.5.4.3 When to add bar code
If the bar code represents information that is contained on the blank form (e.g. form number), the bar code
should be placed on the original prior to making distribution copies from it. A quiet zone containing no dark
marks, lines, print, etc., should surround the bar code area.
If the bar code represents information that is filled in by the user (e.g. an invoice number), the bar code should
be created by the user, and the only form-design requirements would be to allow a sufficiently large quiet zone
and instructions for the placement of a bar code label.
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