Abstract: The present invention relates to an automated data entry and display system. In this system a hand held photoelectric wand scans a document bearing alpha-numeric characters and reads these characters by generating electrical signals which correspond to the optical characteristics of the scanned information; the generated electrical signals are then input to a character recognition device where they are compared with stored reference characters and recognized; signals corresponding to the scanned alpha-numeric characters together with associated signals indicating acceptability or non-acceptability of each scanned character may then be transmitted to a display device where the acceptable and/or unacceptable scanned characters and designated diagnostic legends are displayed.