PDF Association: At the PDF Days Europe, you will be hosting a presentation titled “Structure Recognition for Information Retrieval and Layout” – what’s that about?

Joris Schellekens: Tables, list and other structural elements are found in many digital articles. These elements typically allow the authors to present information in a structured manner and to communicate and summarize key results and main facts. It allows readers to get a quick overview of the presented information, to compare items and put them into context. Knowing the physical boundaries of paragraphs can aid screen-readers for visually impaired uses. Having a concept of tables will help any document-processing flow. And, aside from serving a pure input, structure is a key component when performing conversion. This talk is about bridging the gap between high-level concepts and low-level document formats.

PDF Association: Who is your presentation aimed at?

Joris Schellekens: The presentation aimed at both developers (there is substantial technical content), and decision makers (there is “food for thought” that may be useful, even without full understanding of the technical details).

PDF Association: What will the people who attend your presentation be able to take away from it?

Joris Schellekens: PDF is famously called “the roach motel of data”. It’s where data goes to die. With the right algorithms, this needn’t be the case.

Check out the detailed programme:
https://oos.pdfa.org/pdf-days-europe-2018-schedule-of-sessions/
Direct link for registration:
https://en.xing-events.com/pdf-days-europe-2018.html