ByteScout

ByteScout makes software development kits and APIs that let programmers add document handling to their own applications. Its tools deal with PDFs, barcodes, OCR, spreadsheets and data extraction, and they are offered both as self-hosted SDK packages and as a cloud web API under the PDF.co name.

What ByteScout offers

• Data extraction — templates built in a visual editor, without coding, that read fields, tables and forms from PDFs, images and scans, with output to TXT, JSON, XLS, XLSX, CSV or XML.
• PDF tools — creating PDFs with images, bookmarks and annotations, adding passwords, permissions, digital signatures, watermarks and encryption, and filling or flattening PDF forms.
• PDF to HTML and viewing — conversion that keeps the original layout, plus a viewer component for WinForms apps.
• Barcode reading and generation — 1D and 2D formats such as Code 128, EAN-13, QR Code, Datamatrix, PDF417 and Aztec, read from PDFs, images or a camera.
• OCR — text recognition in several languages, with filters for noisy images and damaged text.

Who it works with

The products are built for software developers, with support for .NET, ASP, C

and VB as well as older VB6, ActiveX and ASP applications. The PDF.co web API also plugs into Zapier and Make for low-code automation.

Key facts

• Delivery: Self-hosted SDK packages and a REST web API
• Platforms: .NET, VB6, ActiveX