24. A method as set forth in claim 20 wherein the step of operating the data processor to process the nodes of the vocabulary model with the beam search technique includes the steps of: establishing a search space as a two dimensional array having N columns and L rows, wherein N=a number of frames, and wherein L=a number of letters in a word of the vocabulary model; and managing a global stack having a plurality of entries, each of the entries including information for specifying a node of the vocabulary model, information for identifying a row and a column location within the two dimensional array, and a normalized probability that a letter string associated with the node represents at least a part of the word written by the writer.
25. A method as set forth in claim 24 wherein the step of operating the data processor to process the nodes of the vocabulary model with the beam search technique further includes the steps of: storing within a memory a hash table having a plurality of entries, each of the hash table entries including information for specifying the normalized probability stored within an entry of the global stack; and generating an index into the hash table in accordance with information that specifies a node of the vocabulary model and in accordance with information that identifies a row and a column location within the two dimensional array.