Slashdot Mirror
Longer Bar Codes Coming in 2005
D_Fresh writes "The same thing that's happening to phone numbers is also happening in retail. The NYT (blahfreeregnotreallyblah) has a story about longer bar codes which will be required for U.S. retailers by 2005. Apparently they're running out of 12-digit codes and need to add a digit, but the code rework for this is non-trivial. Some shortsighted chains *cough*Kmart*cough* may be caught with their pants down in late 2004, since some scanners will simply crash if they scan a 13-digit code they can't handle. Enjoy your :CueCats while they last..."
I did not RTFA, but I think it's worth noting that barcodes aren't unique. I worked retail for a couple of years and in two or three instances I found duplicates.
The store I worked at sold a lot of really cheap stuff, so maybe the problem was rogue manufacturers just randomly generating their product barcodes, hence a pinata might scan as a puzzle.
When we found duplicates we'd just print our own barcodes (which always started with four zeros, I think, to keep them unique) and stick them over top of the manufacturer's barcode.
The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.
I was recently standing in line at the local Sears Hardware store. The guy in front of me was buying an air conditioner. The teller accidentally scanned the shipping label barcode on the box instead of the UPC barcode. It crashed his cash register and all the other cash registers and the server in the back office.
I can just imagine what a nightmare adding a 13th digit is going to be in a system that is that brittle.
When properly modified, A CueCat can scan larger bar codes. As long as the start/end markers on the code remain the same, there should be no worries
Here's an ISBN number I just scanned (maybe this'll get Amazon slashdotted too)
9780924771453
It uses the 39 barcode standard IIRC, just like UPC