QR codes are great for printing machine readable URLs if you have a square space. But they look horrible if placed in a text as they are much taller than a line of text.
Is there a way I can have a 1d-barcode with the same functionality as QR code (URL being the most important feature) so it can be put as text in a normal paragraph without special formatting?
If yes: How do I generate those barcodes?
There're different barcode symbologies that can encode text. The main problem is how much text you want to encode and which apps are you going to use to decode the barcode.
If you're using an URL shortener and you want to stick to a 1D barcode, CODE128 is probably the best choice.
Another option could be a PDF417, it's a 2D barcode but is not square like QRCode. In this case you can encode more chars in less space and this symbology is supported by iOS and the major Barcodes library.
Related
I was reading about barcodes, just a general query I came up with:
Does the length of barcode image change because of the text in it?
For eg: will the length of a barcode with 986262 be different than 111111?
Generally speaking, you can consider barcodes "monospaced". The only cases for which this isn't true are when a character needs an escape code to be represented.
For example in Code 128B, you need to escape to Code 128A to issue a control character like TAB, or in Code 128A you need to switch temporarily to Code 128B to embed a lowercase alphabetical character.
I am working on conversion of pdf in to ZPL. I am using zebra programming language(zpl).
I am trying to control the barcode(any barcode) width using By command.
^By4 is giving lower width and ^By5 is going out of the box.
My use case is I want to achieve narrow bar width in float number(here 4.5). We can not pass float number in By command.
Please let me know if we can achieve this using some other method in ZPL.
You don't mention what barcode format you're using. Some of them, like 2of5, can also accept the ratio parameter for ^BY. The default is ^BY2,3, changing that to ^BY2,2 can make a smaller version:
^XA
^POI
^CFO,20
^BY5,3
^FO100,400
^BJN,100,Y,N
^FD200940^FS
^BY5,2
^FO100,700
^BJN,100,Y,N
^FD200940^FS
^XZ
This generates two barcodes in 2of5, one with the default ratio and one with a smaller ratio. The second one has a tighter barcode that uses less space. Valid values are 2.0-3.0 (although many round off to the same values) so there is some flexibility. Please note, this only works with barcode formats that are not fixed ratio formats.
You can check the manual page for ^BY in the ZPL programmers guide, p123, for the table that shows valid values and which ones round off to the same value (ie, 2.0 and 2.1 give the same results)
The question seems to be weird, but I need to ask this, since I am witnessing a quite interesting output when I compare text as image and graphics as image.
Ideally I am in process of identifying an tool, or algorithm to compare two pdfs, generate output which will highlight the difference between them.
There are possibilities in pdfs, which will have text as image format (legacy text on papers, are converted to pdfs).
and we are doing migration of those legacy pdfs, and finally we are comparing with legacy and converted pdf output.
I am evaluating couple of tools like Adobe dc pro, i-net pdfc and power pdf etc, for comparing two pdfs.
While evaluating, I am able to see graphic images are getting compared(not accurate either) on either side of the pdfs. Where as text as images are completely ignored, unanimously same results in all the tools.
But I am more interested in text as image, since we deal more of legacy text pdfs.
Below, is attached graphic image comparison result, where it could able to capture the differences between the images.
But when I compare text image, differences are not highlighted in the tool.
What I understand from this, text is not compared as image graphics, and tool is completely ignoring the comparison. I would like have clarification whether my assumption is correct.
Secondly, I would like to know how to compare text image in pdfs to generate the differences?.
I'm working for the company that is author of i-net PDFC so I'll answer your first question as well:
Your assumption is correct. i-net PDFC is able to compare images and shapes, but it cannot detect if some content completely changed it's meaning, e.G. a line shape that is used to draw a letter or in your case an image that has to be recognized as text. Recognizing ASCII art as image won't work for the same reason either. Such cases will always be detected as differences even though their visual appearance is similar.
On your second question: Using an OCR conversion tool for one or both documents is a common solution to this problem. A simple image comparison of the compared pages in unlikely to work due to the different font styles and line wrappings in the converted file.
Please note that most OCR applications will use the rendered page images for the recognition. This may lead to incorrect recognition results even if there are no images in the PDF file.
i-net Software is aware of this general issue and an OCR module is currently in development. It'll provide an option to apply the recognition solely to the images in the PDF files.
I am developing a Windows Mobile App that requires printing into a Zebra printer. Problem is, I do not have the printer with me here in my country since the client did not provide any.
My approach was to design a label first in ZebraDesigner2, then print out the label into a text file. Printing the label to a text file instead of a printer sends out the ZPL Code to produce the label I was trying to print. Hence, I can generate ZPL codes faster by designing a label first then seeing the ZPL code. Kinda like having a drag and drop GUI with a background XML.
Say that I have this simple label that contains this text:
Hello World!
If I print this in ZebraDesigner2 it would be written to my text file as:
CT~~CD,~CC^~CT~
^XA~TA000~JSN^LT0^MNW^MTT^PON^PMN^LH0,0^JMA^PR5,5~SD15^JUS^LRN^CI0^XZ
^XA
^MMT
^PW609
^LL0406
^LS0
^FT1,29^A0N,28,28^FH\^FDHello World!^FS
^PQ1,0,1,Y^XZ
My main question is, which one do I include in my C# Code if im going to send this code to the printer via my Windows Mobile C# app? Do I include the part with ^XA until ^XZ? I believe that CT~~CD,~CC^~CT~ should not be included in my code If im not mistaken.
Late answer, but since this is getting viewed...
The CT line and first set of XA..XZ sequence sets up the modes, label length, printable area, etc.
If you remove those, it will take those settings from the label/printer settings, which is usually what you want. The printers can sense the length and width of the label.
Leaving them in can cause big problems, because if you define the printable area in your label, and then the next label type submitted does not, it will use the settings you have defined -- which can cause blank areas in the label, eg. cutoff USPS Label barcodes that are printed after your Zebra Designer custom labels.
Found this out the hard way - leave those out, and you should leave out of the remaining XA..XZ sequence the MMT, PW609, LL0406, and LS0 as well - your Hello World will not be affected.
If you really want to limit the area printed to, set up margins inside the printable area, etc, refer to the manual.
you have to look at the programmers guide before you remove anything of the code. The CT~ command for example changes the control prefix.
Search the internet or zebra.com site for "ZPL Programming guide".
So, leave the text file as is and then include that into your windows mobile application.
PS: zebra offers SDKs for label/receipt printers: http://www.zebra.com/gb/en/products-services/software/adapt-software.html
PS2: without a test printer you may get bad final results.
As per an example URL shortened here:
http://goo.gl/info/kW1c#week
What is the displayed 2D barcode for (copied here):
It's actually a 2D barcode, and it is a QR code. It is meant to print on stickers and what not to read with your cell phone camera.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_Code
Takes you to the webpage of the shortened URL (usually for mobile devices that can read a QR code).
bonus:
to get a QR code for a goo.gl URL - append .qr :
http://goo.gl/kW1c.qr
Quick answer: printing these barcodes on a webpage is a common way to let people visit/bookmark that page from their phone (using the phone's camera and barcode reader function).
It is important to understand a barcode is a piece of text data, and not an instruction. For example, the above bar code contains the text "http://goo.gl/info/kW1c".
It is the application reading the barcode which interprets it as an instruction. The data is read by a barcode reading application (for example, on a smart phone), and then an appropriate action is typically launched depending on the type of data. For example, if the text starts with "http://" a browser may be launched with that URL. If the data starts with "phone:" the phone application may be launch with that number.