Let's see if I can bring some more light on this. Morten's answer is really good, but there were some things that were mis-communicated in parts of the thread.
I work for the company that invented the barcode and barcode scanner and is the largest seller of scanning devices and OEM engines in the world. Barbara, imaging (I think you said visual scanners) are required to do this properly, but you are incorrect in your assumption that they are somehow more standard in Europe and N. America. While I agree there are more Laser Scanners in the US b/c there are older and more legacy systems especially in standard retail environments, many many enterprises are well on their way to imaging scanners as a norm. It is the only way to scan not only barcodes from a screen, but also to do any sort of 2D barcode scanning. The AA example couldn't have happened/worked if they weren't already using imaging scanners. Almost all ticket scanners are imaging due to the use of 2D scanners. Morten said something about NFC/RFID being years away. Well THIS is geographic. In Korea and Japan, NFC being built into phones is well the standard. The entire train system of Tokyo and others in Japan is totally based on these technologies. There are lots of cultural reasons that these technologies won't deploy in other areas and I don't think it is years away from the US, I think it is forever away from the US and I believe that BC's is actually the right answer for us. I think Europe will probably go the direction of NFC. This is for the same reasons that the US won't do chip & pin even though that is a standard in Europe (if not the rest of the world). We are just weirded out culturally by RFID. Look at the Walmart debacle. I like Gretchen's example of taking pictures of barcodes and sending them in to find out what they mean. I do know that there are phones out there that come with barcode decoders built in. Motorola's MC35 for example has a camera scanner built in (1/2 digital camera; 1/2 barcode scanner). Using barcodes as a 2-way encoding communications/data management device is a bit "weird" in consumer facing scenarios, but I think there are cases where it can be really useful. Dante, since you are working in the arena of health, you should know that barcoding is a standard in patient care and document management, so there are a ton of applications in this regard. -- dave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=28823 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
