JotNot Scanner Pro

JotNot basic interface

 JotNot Scanner Pro is an interesting little app for iPhone* that essentially turns your phone's camera into a document scanner.  It's not a Fujitsu ScanSnap... but in a pinch, it's pretty awesome (and it's totally unfair to compare it to a $450 ScanSnap... but I will a couple of time in this post).  Also, at only $1.99 it is quite a bit cheaper than the ScanSnap.  You can email the results of the scans or take advantage of the tight integration with Evernote, Dropbox and Google Docs.  To see an example of the results this app can kick out, I recently used it to scan this 7-page document of David Foster Wallace's epic 2005 Kenyon College Commencement Speech.

*ipod touch or ipad, too

Perceived Ease of Use
While the learning curve on this app is not too complicated (once you know what you are doing), my first few times with it were not overly positive.  However, once you establish how to ensure you get the best quality scans (see Tips & Tricks below) and how to navigate through the JotNot screens, you will find that you can scan pretty quickly and easily (about a page every 20-30 seconds).  If you use apps regularly on the iPhone you will have little troubles learning this one.

Perceived Usefulness

Having this app at my disposal is incredibly useful.  Sure, I don't use it everyday and it's not worthy of a coveted spot on my home screen but I'm glad I've got access to it.  Likely, you will be in the same boat and probably won't use this app all the time (and when you do you will rarely use it to scan documents longer than 5-7 pages).  The app would be more useful to me if it could create readable PDFs but having OCR built into a $1.99 app would be a bit too much to ask for.  You can OCR through Google Docs (with which JotNot integrates nicely), but only if the file size is 2MB or less.

Pros

• It's about a portable as it can possible get
• Easily integrates with Dropbox, Evernote, Google Docs, and more
• You can create multi-page PDFs
• Creates very readable PDFs (take a look at a full page scan)
• Process cleans up background really well
• Fax your scans from your phone (I didn't try this... it's not free, but who faxes anymore?)

Cons

• Overall speed (The DFW scan took 3:30 with JotNot and 35 secs with ScanSnap)
• Size of scans (DFW with JotNot = 5.49MB.  With ScanSnap = 551k)
• Doesn't create searchable PDFs

Final Thoughts
I think you should buy this app.  The first time it gets you out of a pickle you can comment on this post and thank me for it.

Tips & Tricks

• Use a plain, neutral background and detect edges will work really well
• Take pictures straight down if you can (like in the image above)
• Use the "stabilize" button every time (it's slower but better quality)
• Go through all the menus, click on every button.  Great way to learn to navigate around.
• Use the "Enhancement Options" (presets for black & white, color, etc.)
• Swipe scanned documents on the home screen to delete, edit, star, etc.
• Open your scans in iBooks to read them on iPad
• Try it for other documents (recipes, receipts, etc.)