Optimization of Weights in a Multiple Classifier Handwritten Word Recognition System Using a Genetic Algorithm

Automatic handwritten text recognition by computer has a number of interesting applications. However, due to a great variety of individual writing styles, the problem is very difficult and far from being solved. Recently, a number of classifier creation methods, known as ensemble methods, have been proposed in the field of machine learning. They have shown improved recognition performance over single classifiers. For the combination of these classifiers many methods have been proposed in the literature. In this paper we describe a weighted voting scheme where the weights are obtained by a genetic algorithm.