Optical mark readers have been used for decades and have been determined to be the fastest, most cost-effective and accurate means for getting data into a computer system. Designing, producing and storing OMR forms, however, has not been as efficient.

• Lead time to design and obtain preprinted scannable forms is on average 5 weeks.
• High minimum-quantity requirements that demand storage and inventory.
• High form creation and printing cost. Additional charges for customization, foreign languages and duplex forms.
• Preprinted forms are frequently "pre-slugged" (printed on) before they are filled out by the user.

Creating these forms electronically provides a significant cost savings over the traditional pre-printed method and allows for on-demand customized printing.

The Solution

Proform Designer and DeskTop Designer now allow these forms to be created right at your PC and printed on common high-speed and desktop laser printers. The critical alignment of the OMR form elements is handled entirely by the software. Therefore, there is never a need to manually align timing marks with response bubbles and form identification marks.

Other common OMR design techniques, such as title boxes, written response boxes and response numbering, are also automated. Once your OMR form is designed, it can easily be printed to one or more supported printers.

The Benefits

Proform Designer and DeskTop Designer enable in-house replication of OMR forms that, until now, had been difficult to produce. Turn-around time is reduced from weeks to hours allowing users to create customized OMR forms "on demand".

Most OMR forms contain variable data. Since the OMR form and data can now be printed simultaneously, there are no additional steps required to produce the form.

Proform Designer and DeskTop Designer share a sophisticated, toolbar-driven interface. OMR elements are created and customized with the click of the mouse

The Features