2023.1:Batch (Object)

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20252023.120232.80

Batches are the fundamental units for documents in Grooper. They are a hierarchy of folders and pages used to represent documents and process them.

Glossary

The following is a list of terms you will see in this article along with their definitions.

  • Batch: An object in Grooper that contains the documents brought into Grooper via scanning or import.
  • Batch Folder: Any folder contained within the Batch. This includes the Batch level itself.
  • Batch Page: A single page object in a Batch, usually found at the last level of the Batch. Also referred to as a "Page".
  • Batch Process: A Grooper object that consists of several Batch Process Steps that are designed to apply activities to a Batch.
  • Document Folder: Any Batch Folder that contains a complete document. Usually created after a Separate step in a Batch Process.
  • Folder Level: The place or "level" at which a Batch Folder or a Batch Page appears within a Batch.

About

You may download the ZIP(s) below and upload it into your own Grooper environment (version 2023.1). This contains one or more Batches of sample documents.

What is a Batch?

A Batch is an object in Grooper that contains the documents brought into Grooper via scanning or import.

There are three components to a batch:

  1. The Batch itself
  2. Batch Folders
  3. Batch Pages

Batch objects in Grooper contain two child objects:

  • The root Batch Folder, containing a hierarchy of Batch Folders and Batch Pages.
  • A read-only Batch Process, containing the list of processing instructions for the Batch Folders and Batch Pages

Below is an extremely simple Batch.  We are viewing it Grooper Dashboard, using the "Batch Viewer" tab. Multiple folder levels can be created in a batch depending on how complicated your documents are.

  1. The Test Batch is located here on the node tree.
  2. The Test Batch has two child objects, the root Batch Folder and a read-only Batch Process.


  1. If we open up the root Batch Folder...
  2. We can see the Batch Pages. We can also view the hierarchy of Batch Folders and Pages here after Separation.


  1. If we click on the Batch object in the node tree...
  2. We can click on the "Viewer" tab to see the Batch Viewer.
  3. Here we can see the contents of the Batch.


  1. At the top level is the Batch itself.
  2. Here we have the pages at Level 1 in the Batch.
  3. Here we can see the Batch and Pages as objects in the node tree.


  1. Through the process of separation, pages will be separated into document folders.
  2. These pages are now contained within "Folder (1)".
  3. Here we can see the hierarchy of folders and pages within the Batch in the node tree.

Folder Levels

When scanning pages into Grooper, the pages come in one at a time and there is no differentiation between one document or another. As part of Grooper's workflow, pages are normally separated into Document Folders (each folder containing one complete document) so that Grooper knows where one document begins and ends.

Depending on the complexity of the documents brought into Grooper, sometimes a Batch can be comprised of multiple levels of Batch Folders within Batch Folders until you get to the Document Folder with the pages inside (A Document Folder is just a Batch Folder that contains the pages of a document).

For certain activities, it is important to tell Grooper which Folder Level the activity needs to be executed on.

  • The Batch Level is always the first and top folder in the Batch. It contains all folders and pages within the Batch. This is considered "Level 0".
  • The first set of Batch Folders under the Batch Level is considered "Level 1".
  • A folder that is inside of a "Level 1" folder is at a "Level 2", a folder that is inside of a "Level 2" folder is at a "Level 3", and so on.
  • A Page is always considered to be at the "Page Level".
    • Sometimes you will have pages inside folders of different levels, but you always want to run certain activities on all pages. You would set those activities to a "Page" level.

For example, OCR text is obtained from images by running a Recognize activity at the Page level. Document classification is done by running a Classify activity at the Folder level. Exporting is done by running a Document Export activity at the Batch level.




Production vs Test Batches

Batches exist in two environments:

  • Production
    • Stored in the Batches > Production branch of the Grooper node tree.
    • The Batch is contained in a folder according to the Batch Process being applied to the Batch.
  • Test
    • Stored in the Batches > Test branch of the Grooper node tree.
  1. Production Batches
  2. Test Batches

So, what are the differences between a Test and Production Batch?

  • Test Batches: These are only visible to Grooper Design users. They are used to test extraction and Batch Process steps being designed.
  • Production Batches: are visible to all users who have appropriate access rights. Production Batches are actively run through a Batch Process that has previously been designed and published.

Both Test and Production Batches can be created and processed from the Grooper Design page by Design users. However, typically, production Batches are created and processed using the "Grooper Batches" page. This also means that multiple users at multiple access levels can affect Batch workflow.

Test Batches, however, will only be seen by "Design" users.

  1. Design Page
  2. Batches Page

How To

Creating a Test Batch

Creating a Test Batch is relatively simple. First, you must create an empty Batch. Then you can just drag and drop the files from your computer into the Batch.


  1. To add a Test Batch, right-click on the Test folder in the node tree.
  2. Hover over "Add" and then click on "Batch..."


  1. Give your Batch a name.
  2. Click "EXECUTE" to create the Batch.


  1. Select the newly created Batch.
  2. Select the "Viewer" tab.
  3. Now you can see that we have an empty Batch. All you need to do now is to drag and drop a file from your computer to this area and your file will be added to Grooper.


  1. Here we have added a PDF file that contained several pages. These come into Grooper as page objects.


Creating a Production Batch

There are two ways to create a Production Batch in Grooper:

  1. Scanned content: Scanned documents are brought into Grooper from the Batches Page. For more information on scanning documents into Grooper, see our Desktop Scanning in Grooper article.
  2. Imported content: Importing digital content into Grooper happens in the Import Page. An article detailing how to import Batches via the Import Page will be coming soon.