Advice on which 2D Barcode font to purchase

[adenke]

I need to implement the use of 2D barcodes as part of an Amazon fulfillment requirement. Basically, I am to encode the packing list for a box in a 2D barcode on the outside of the box. This could be as many as 50 lines of information (or perhaps more), but is more likely to be about 20 on average.

Amazon currently supports these 2D barcode formats: PDF417, Data Matrix,QR code and Maxicode.

I was initially attracted to Data Matrix because you have an article with some sample code on printing Data Matrix 2D barcodes using Visual Basic 6. The program that I intend to integrate the barcodes into is a program I wrote in VB6.

I also have written programs in C#.net but this is not really in my comfort zone as I have mostly modified existing programs - I'm a bit of a programming Amish and tend to go back to VB6.

What are the reasons for choosing one particular barcode over another? Is one of the formats more likely to be supported longer than the others?

[glitch]

Datamatrix and PDF417 are widely used in carrier industry. The QRCode is gaining popularity in the recent years. For space efficiency data matrix is the best (see http://www.morovia.com/kb/Barcode-Space ... 10620.html). I would suggest that you choose data matrix or QRCode. Both DataMatrix Fonts and Encoder 5 (http://www.morovia.com/fonts/datamatrix/) and QRCode 5 (http://www.morovia.com/fonts/qrcode/) include font-based solution as well as ActiveX based solution that can be used in VB6.

[adenke]

I purchased the Datamatrix package but there is no font file. I'm really confused. I am trying to implement this in VB6. The code here: http://www.morovia.com/kb/Printing-2D-b ... 10095.html indicates that there is a font called "MRV Datamatrix", but I see no such font file in the installed files.

[glitch]

The "MRV DataMatrix" is included in datamatrix fonts 3.0, but not in the most recent version 5. In version 5, the font has changed its structure and the name becomes "MRV DataMatrix5". You should find it after you install the software.

Note that the font cannot be applied on the data string. You need to call the encoder function to "encode" the data string into barcode string first, then apply the font on the barcode string. See http://www.morovia.com/kb/Obtaining-Bar ... 10621.html (this is VBScript but VB6 is very similar).

[adenke]

Okay, I'm rather confused. I tried using the code you sent me to, but it has the line "Set obj = WScript.CreateObject("cruflMorovia.DataMatrix5")" in it, which I don't really understand what that does and it doesn't seem to be VB6 compatible.

I was attracted to this product because of the link I listed which apparently relates to an earlier release. As that example was in VB6, it made sense to me and I expected to have it built into my existing program quickly and be up and running. I just need a simple way to create a Datamatrix barcode from a string that I paste into a text box. I really don't see a good VB example other than what you listed here - can you help me understand what I need to do - I added the Visual Basic module that's included in the package and I've registered both the DLLs that are included, but this code still doesn't work for me. I'm sure I'm just missing something stupid, but I can't get past the error on the line that I listed above because I don't really understand what it's supposed to be doing.

[glitch]

The equivalent VB6 statement is

Code: Select all

CreateObject("cruflMorovia.DataMatrix5")

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/librar ... 60%29.aspx

After the barcode string is retrieved, you use the same code to send the barcode string (with font) to the printer.

[adenke]

Ah, thanks - I had already worked out a way to print the barcode since I posted this. Pretty simple, really with the datamatrixencode() function that's included in the VB module in the package. This is great stuff - now I just have to find out if the barcode I need to create is too big for my boxes - lots of information to include. Thanks for your help!

[adenke]

Hmmm.... maybe I'm not done - I just dumped complete packing list information into the function and it returned "ERROR" because my data is too long. Does anyone know specifically how the DataMatrixEncode() function works with "MaxSize" and SizeIDRequested?

[glitch]

Data matrix has a capacity limit of around 2000 alpha numeric characters. Also it would be very difficult to scan such a large barcode.

http://www.morovia.com/manuals/datamatr ... 01-table-1

I checked the VB6 file Morovia.DataMatrixFontDLL5.bas. If you put sizeIDRequested = -1 and it still gives an error, the data encoded is too big.

Are you sure that you want to encode thousands of characters into the barcode?