2D Barcodes

Until recently, businesses have relied on linear barcode symbols to achieve productivity. Productivity is important to every business, and interest in 2D (two dimensional) bar coding is growing rapidly due to its benefits over linear barcode symbologies. However, deployment is still lagging largely due in part to the high cost of marketing for this innovative technology as well as the margins manufacturers require to recoup R&D cost. From the consumer standpoint, added project development costs are usually associated in leveraging the increased information from the 2D symbol. In general, every software or database application receiving 2D scanned input must be modified in order to accommodate the thousands of bytes of data from the scanned 2D symbol. Up to now, implementation has been generally very expensive in small to medium size businesses that may not have the time or ability to afford software programmers to make these modifications even if the benefits of 2D bar coding are clear.

Processing 2D Scanned Data

The principle behind scanning a 2D or linear barcode symbol is very much the same. The difference, however, lies in the amount of data that is transferred from the barcode scanner to the software or database application. Since most businesses can easily add 2D symbols to the documents and labels that already exist, the only crucial implementation issue left unanswered is “How do I process all of that data?”

A linear (1D) barcode encodes an index into a record of a database. In other words, the value of a linear barcode symbol generally corresponds to an input field of the software application. Therefore, pre-processing of the scanned input before it is sent to the software application is usually not required. With 2D symbols, however, an entire record of a database can be stored in a single barcode. If a 2D symbol is employed, data processing (i.e. parsing, editing, formatting, re-ordering, etc.) is necessary to extract the appropriate information from the 2D symbol. Therefore, the existing software application will have to be modified in order to support the 2D symbol. For all practical purposes, however, the 2D symbol should complement a business’ current system and not be the driving force to change or modify the software application.

A single 2D symbol can easily hold specific corporate information as well as information that is unique to each department. Each department can then in turn process the data from the 2D symbol differently. With the ability to process the data after it has been scanned and before it enters the software application, major changes to departmental applications and operational procedures are eliminated. Often, the 2D software solutions can even be configured to process the data differently depending upon the information contained inside the symbol.

2D Barcoding Made Practical

Usually most 2D scanners connect via the keyboard or serial (COM) port. In recent years, however, connection via the keyboard port appears to be the most popular since the installation is much simpler. Regardless of the input connection type, 2D software solutions exists to process the scanned input data in real-time so that the software application does not need to or have to be modified. This creative approach makes 2D bar coding practical and affordable for most businesses considering this technology. Data can easily be edited, formatted, parsed, remapped, and re-ordered with no programming required. In addition, since the scanned input data is processed before it is transferred to the software application, unique features such as Windows message prompting and even sounds for user-defined triggered events exist to take full advantage of the PC’s capabilities. These features can be used to prompt the user to take specific action(s) and/or provide instruction when certain user-defined events occur (e.g. a particular barcode is scanned).

The true benefit lies in the fact that the user can continue to use the existing business software with no costly modifications. Often, the source code may not be available to even modify. With these new 2D software tools, a substantial amount of the project development cost and time to support the increase in information can be eliminated. Until now, this drawback was usually one of the primary reasons why companies waited to integrate 2D bar coding. Now with these 2D software utilities, users can maximize the full potential of 2D bar coding by extracting only the information that is needed in any order and in any formatÑa fully custom solution.

The benefit of 2D bar coding is clear and certainly with this new innovative software approach, 2D bar coding may be more appealing to those who are waiting.

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