PaddleOCR Text Recognition Skill

When to Use This Skill

Invoke this skill in the following situations:

Extract text from images (screenshots, photos, scans, charts)
Read text from PDFs or document images
Extract text from structured documents (invoices, receipts, forms)
Extract text from URLs or local files pointing to images/PDFs

Do not use this skill in the following situations:

Plain text files that can be read directly with the Read tool
Code files or markdown documents
Tasks that do not involve image-to-text conversion

How to Use This Skill

MANDATORY RESTRICTIONS - DO NOT VIOLATE

ONLY use PaddleOCR Text Recognition API - Execute the script python scripts/ocr_caller.py
NEVER use Claude's built-in vision - Do NOT read images yourself
NEVER offer alternatives - Do NOT suggest "I can try to read it" or similar
IF API fails - Display the error message and STOP immediately
NO fallback methods - Do NOT attempt OCR any other way

If the script execution fails (API not configured, network error, etc.):

Show the error message to the user
Do NOT offer to help using your vision capabilities
Do NOT ask "Would you like me to try reading it?"
Simply stop and wait for user to fix the configuration

Basic Workflow

Identify the input source:
- User provides URL: Use the --file-url parameter
- User provides local file path: Use the --file-path parameter
- User uploads image: Save it first, then use --file-path

Execute OCR:

python scripts/ocr_caller.py --file-url "URL provided by user" --pretty

Or for local files:

python scripts/ocr_caller.py --file-path "file path" --pretty

Save result to file (recommended):

python scripts/ocr_caller.py --file-url "URL" --output result.json --pretty

Parse JSON response:
- Check the ok field: true means success, false means error
- Extract text: text field contains all recognized text
- Handle errors: If ok is false, display error.message
Present results to user:
- Display extracted text in a readable format
- If the text is empty, the image may contain no text

IMPORTANT: Complete Output Display

CRITICAL: Always display the COMPLETE recognized text to the user. Do NOT truncate or summarize the OCR results.

The script returns the full JSON with complete text content in text field
You MUST display the entire text content to the user, no matter how long it is
Do NOT use phrases like "Here's a summary" or "The text begins with..."
Do NOT truncate with "..." unless the text truly exceeds reasonable display limits
The user expects to see ALL the recognized text, not a preview or excerpt

Correct approach:

I've extracted the text from the image. Here's the complete content:

[Display the entire text here]

Incorrect approach:

I found some text in the image. Here's a preview:
"The quick brown fox..." (truncated)

Usage Examples

URL OCR:

python scripts/ocr_caller.py --file-url "https://example.com/invoice.jpg" --pretty

Local File OCR:

python scripts/ocr_caller.py --file-path "./document.pdf" --pretty

Understanding the Output

The script outputs JSON structure as follows:

{
  "ok": true,
  "text": "All recognized text here...",
  "result": { ... },
  "error": null
}

Key fields:

ok: true for success, false for error
text: Complete recognized text
result: Raw API response (for debugging)
error: Error details if ok is false

First-Time Configuration

When API is not configured:

The error will show:

CONFIG_ERROR: PADDLEOCR_OCR_API_URL not configured. Get your API at: https://paddleocr.com

Configuration workflow:

Show the exact error message to user (including the URL)

Tell user to provide credentials:

Please visit the URL above to get your PADDLEOCR_OCR_API_URL and PADDLEOCR_ACCESS_TOKEN.
Once you have them, send them to me and I'll configure it automatically.

When user provides credentials (accept any format):
- PADDLEOCR_OCR_API_URL=https://xxx.paddleocr.com/ocr, PADDLEOCR_ACCESS_TOKEN=abc123...
- Here's my API: https://xxx and token: abc123
- Copy-pasted code format
- Any other reasonable format
Parse credentials from user's message:
- Extract PADDLEOCR_OCR_API_URL value (look for URLs with paddleocr.com or similar)
- Extract PADDLEOCR_ACCESS_TOKEN value (long alphanumeric string, usually 40+ chars)

Configure automatically:

python scripts/configure.py --api-url "PARSED_URL" --token "PARSED_TOKEN"

If configuration succeeds:
- Inform user: "Configuration complete! Running OCR now..."
- Retry the original OCR task
If configuration fails:
- Show the error
- Ask user to verify the credentials

Error Handling

Authentication failed:

API_ERROR: Authentication failed (403). Check your token.

Token is invalid, reconfigure with correct credentials

Quota exceeded:

API_ERROR: API rate limit exceeded (429)

Daily API quota exhausted, inform user to wait or upgrade

No text detected:

text field is empty
Image may be blank, corrupted, or contain no text

Tips for Better Results

If recognition quality is poor, suggest:

Check if the image is clear and contains text
Provide a higher resolution image if possible

Reference Documentation

For in-depth understanding of the OCR system, refer to:

references/output_schema.md - Output format specification
references/provider_api.md - Provider API contract

Note: Model version and capabilities are determined by your API endpoint (PADDLEOCR_OCR_API_URL).

Testing the Skill

To verify the skill is working properly:

python scripts/smoke_test.py

This tests configuration and API connectivity.

paddleocr-text-recognition