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COMPUTER1313 OP t1_j8qbb1f wrote

> D. Kriesel, a German Ph.D. student studying computational geometry, encountered a strange problem when scanning a blueprint on a common Xerox office scanner. The numbers denoting the square footage of rooms were totally wrong, and what's more, they changed when he scanned the blueprint again.

>Intrigued, Kriesel tried scanning a table of costs and figures. Numbers changed again—but not wildly, just by a little bit: 54.60 became 54.80, for instance.

Another article on that same news: https://www.theregister.com/2013/08/06/xerox_copier_flaw_means_dodgy_numbers_and_dangerous_designs/

Yeah, that could potentially result in lawsuits or other legal mess with Xerox being caught in the crossfire. Such as a purchase contract's or construction plan's numbers being silently changed.

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Totally_Not_A_Bot_55 t1_j8qc1jm wrote

Did the Challenger shuttle program use xerox machines?

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purchankruly t1_j8rxsnf wrote

I’d bet not, only because this OCR-ish software wouldn’t have existed back in the 80s and 90s.

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marmorset t1_j8ssfjv wrote

I was using a scanner with OCR software in 1991. It was a somewhat new technology, but not cutting edge. I worked for a small publishing company and while the OCR wasn't perfect, it was still much better than having to retype an entire book.

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Hattix t1_j8qkmql wrote

No it wouldn't.

The use of the aggressive JBIG2 setting was not default. You had to change it yourself on the MFD's interface, where there was a warning saying that this setting could cause character substitution errors.

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Shishire t1_j8raxy5 wrote

It ultimately turned out that it did it even on the highest setting, so that the only way to actually get a clean scan was to scan to TIFF.

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spoke2 t1_j8qc0sk wrote

Better get some Scribners on staff.

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SuperToxin t1_j8sgw3z wrote

Imagine having like your finances being skewed because you used one of these. Insane. Lmao.

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