Does anyone knows if it's possible interact director with devices like barcode reader and credit card machines? How it can be done? there's anybody else around with crazy ideas like this? :-)
Mostly ignore the other two posts. You can get USB barcode and credit card readers, they plug into a USB port (on any platform that supports USB) and work right away, without any Xtras. The numbers coming from a barcode exactly match what you can read on the label. You can configure the barcode reader to put characters before or after that, so for example you could append a return character, and then just watch for a return coming in. If you choose not to use a return, you would probably need to watch letters coming in and try to spot when the end of the number is reached, possibly by timing how long it was since the last letter came in.
Credit cards are a bit tougher, as there are two track and three track magnetic strips. There are definitions for both, so it is possible to get the person's first and last name, and the card number, from the right place in the stream of text you get.
If you have a client who has existing serial barcode readers, then you might need to get into serial Xtras, etc, but if you're starting from scratch it would be worth getting a USB one, and not have any of that hassle.
BTW, the hardest part of all of this is how to deal with regular keyboard input, how can you tell whether it's a user typing or a barcode coming in? I've used both barcode and credit card at the same time, and got around the keyboard entry part by having that as an on screen touch keyboard, which doesn't involve the normal keyboard at all, leaving all keyboard input to be coming from the two devices.
I have info somewhere on the format for a credit card if you need it.
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