Yes, Patrick, this is possible- including some errors. I give you an example:

1. I loaded up this image to ChatGPT (a verse from AK):

2. ChatGPT produced this transkription (searchable):

धूमग्निस्तरणिर्मित्रशत्रुभानुगभस्तिरोचनः ।
विभावसुसुप्रीहपतिस्तेपवांस्तपतिर्यपातिः ॥ ३० ॥

3. a transliteration

dhūmagniḥ taraṇir mitraśatrubhānugabhastirocanaḥ |
vibhāvasuḥ suprīhaḥ patiḥ te pavāṁs tapatiḥ ravipātiḥ || 30 ||

4. and this translation:

Dies ist ein Vers aus dem Amarakosha, einem bekannten Sanskrit-Thesaurus. Der Vers listet Synonyme für die Sonne (Surya) auf:

„Dhūmagni, Taraṇi, Mitra, Śatru, Bhānu, Gabhasti, Rocaṇa, Vibhāvasu, Suprīha, Pati, Tapavāṁs, Tapatī, Ravipāti“
→ all dies sind Namen oder Bezeichnungen für die Sonne.

ChatGPT do not care about any font, by which the devanagari text was produced and needs more training as you can see.

Best

Heiner

Dear Friends:

I am wondering whether with the advance of AI technology we have easy OCR software to read Devanāgarī, easy enough to be used by someone like me!! We have the one prepared by Andrew Ollett, which he generously gave us. But that requires computer knowledge far beyond my reach. Is there on where you can just drop the Devanāgari scan, out pops a searchable file. This is probably a long shot, but I thought I would ask.

With thanks and best wishes,

Patrick Olivelle

_______________________________________________
INDOLOGY mailing list
INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology

-- 
Dr. R. H. Koch - Germany/Sri Lanka 
www.rolfheinrichkoch.wordpress.com