This tool extracts the structure from a PDF or image of a form.
By default it uses the Claude 3 LLM model by Anthropic.
But it can also use the OpenAI LLM.
A single extraction of an A4 form page costs about 10p.
It replicates the form structure in JSON, following the schema used by GOV.UK Forms.
It then uses that to generate a multi-page web form in the GOV.UK style.
Here's a short demo video:
form-extractor-v2-alpha.mov
You'll notice that it doesn't try to faithfully replicate every field in a question. Instead, it uses the relevant components and patterns from the GOV.UK Design System. This is a feature not a bug ;-)
You'll need either an Anthropic API key, or an Open AI one.
Add the key as a local environment variable called ANTHROPIC_API_KEY, or OPENAI_API_KEY.
Install the app locally with npm install.
You'll also need to install GraphicsMagick. It's used to convert PDF pages into images.
There's a guide for doing that here.
Start the app locally with npm start dev.
It'll be available at http://localhost:3000/
- processing PDF forms or images of forms
- breaking a form down into questions
- distinguishing between question, hint and field text
- distinguishing between single-choice and multiple-choice questions
- recognising common question types like 'name', 'address', 'date' etc.
- recognising when an image isn't a form
- recognising when a question has conditional routing
- processing hand drawn forms
- browsing previously processed forms
- it only knows about certain kinds of question types
- you can't provide your own API key via the UI
- like a lot of Gen AI, it can be unpredictable
Disclaimer: This is a prototype and I am not a developer ;-).
The main UI is in app/views/index.html.
Other Nunjucks page templates and macros are in app/views.
Additional CSS styles are in assets/style.scss.
Generate updates to the CSS with sass assets/style.scss public/assets/style.css.
The script in public/assets/scripts.js enhances file upload and adds loading spinners.
The form in index.html uploads the file to the server.
If it's a PDF it uses GraphicsMagick to convert the pages into image files.
Form files are stored in subfolders in public/results.
The images are sent to an LLM, along with a prompt and JSON schema, via the 'SendToLLM' function in server.js.
The JSON schema for each LLM is specified in data/.
The results are saved as a JSON files in the subfolders in public/results.
Those files are used to generate the pages that are loaded into iframes in app/views/index.html.
The form components are specificed in app/views/answer-types.njk
They are built using the Nunjucks components in GOV.UK Frontend.
Page rendering is defined in the URL routing rules found at the bottom of server.js.
