This article is an index page summarizing a series of articles on setting up an OCR (optical character recognition) environment using Google Cloud Vision API, troubleshooting, and operational know-how.
If you are about to set up an OCR environment or are stuck with GCP settings, we recommend reading in the following order.
1. Implementation & Troubleshooting
Here are the IAM permission troubles encountered first and their solutions. This will be a hint if it doesn't work even if you follow the official documentation.
Why Cloud Vision API OCR Fails with IAM and the Complete Record of Getting It to Work A record of bypassing the issue where roles/vision.user could not be granted by using project-level permission settings.
2. Operations & Best Practices
Why you should operate with CLI (command line) instead of GUI. Explains the background of why I started running OCR frequently and its benefits.
Why Running Cloud Vision OCR via CLI Was the Easiest About the benefits of visualizing and simplifying the "authentication flow" with CLI, which becomes invisible in GCP GUI settings.
Why GCP x VSC x CLI Is the Correct Route for Frequent OCR Digging deep into why this configuration is the "expert's correct route" from the perspectives of accuracy, cost, and operation.
A Practical Guide to Building a CLI Tool for Cloud Vision OCR Configuration and implementation examples of the CLI tool actually in use. About the automation flow from throwing a PDF to receiving text.
[Free Code] Minimal Script to Safely Run Cloud Vision OCR via CLI A Python script (for copy-paste) to safely execute OCR without hardcoding credentials.
3. Extra: How to Deal with GCP
Lessons learned when dealing with GCP, not limited to OCR. A failure story I want you to read before you get exhausted by the GUI.
Story of How Escaping to Cloud Shell + CUI Was Faster When Stuck in GCP GUI (Failure Story) About the superiority of Cloud Shell in troubleshooting and collaboration with AI.
Series Conclusion Cloud Vision OCR is powerful, but environment setup (especially IAM and authentication) is the first hurdle. The key to stable and low-cost operation is not to try to complete everything with just the GUI, but to utilize CLI (Cloud Shell / Local) to keep the configuration simple.
