RECOGNITION OF AND OPERATION ON TEXT DATA

Text of a predetermined class is recognized in a body of text. After recognition, operations relevant to the recognized text may be performed. For example, text such as telephone numbers, telefax numbers, and dates can be recognized in a body of text. Options are provided for selecting and running operations and programs relevant to the recognized text, such as, telephone dialers, telefaxing programs, writable databases etc. Libraries of subroutines are provided for each class of text to be recognized. Each library typically includes a plurality of operations which may be run on the particular class of text. The libraries are recognized at run time of an application, so that additional libraries and operations may be added without a need for recompiling. A single class of text is recognizable in a number of formats without limits as to the origin of the body of text.