This paper examines several line-drawing pattern recognition methods for handwritten character recognition. They are the picture descriptive language (PDL), Berthod and Maroy (BM), extended Freeman's chain code (EFC), error transformation (ET), tree grammar (TG), and array grammar (AG) methods. A new character recognition scheme that uses improved extended octal codes as primitives is introduced. This scheme offers the advantages of handling flexible sizes, orientations, and variations, the need for fewer learning samples, and lower degree of ambiguity. Finally, the simulation of off-line character recognition by the real-time on-line counterpart is investigated.