QRCode a FileMaker plug-in, provides the ability to print QRCode bar codes from any FileMaker database. QR Codes can contain URLs, Unicode and Kanji text. When attached to a physical object and scanned by a camera phone, they provide an immediate link to a webpage, or informational text. Emerging informal standards now allow scanning entries into phonebook/calendar, and immediate dialing, SMS, and tweets.
Unlike other bar code plug-ins, QRCode does NOT require the installation of any special fonts. Barcodes are generated as images native to the platform. QRCode provides full control over the size, shape, orientation, and error correction of the bar codes. Automatic transcoding of FileMaker's character set eliminates problems scanning special characters.
The latest QRCode is optimized for Win 7/OS 10.6/FileMaker 11, and will work back to Win 98/OS 10.2/FileMaker 7.
About QR Code
A QR Code is a two-dimensional bar code created by Japanese corporation Denso-Wave in 1994. The "QR" is derived from "Quick Response", as the creator intended the code to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed. A single QR Code barcode can carry up to 4000 characters of machine-readable data in a space no larger than a standard bar code. Unlike traditional one-dimensional bar codes which depend on real-time links to records in a separate database, the QR Code symbol contains the record itself. QR Codes are common in Japan where they are currently the most popular type of two dimensional code.
Although initially used for tracking parts in vehicle manufacturing, QR Codes are now used in a much broader context spanning both commercial tracking applications as well as convenience-oriented applications aimed at mobile phone users. QR Codes storing addresses, email addresses, and URLs may appear in magazines, on signs, buses, business cards, invoices or just about any object that a user might need information about. A user having a camera phone equipped with the correct reader software can scan the image of the QR Code causing the phone to show the programmed URL, insert a calendar event (e.g. their next appointment), enter a complete contact record, place a phone call, or send an SMS or tweet. This act of linking from physical world objects is known as a hardlink or physical world hyperlinks.
QR Code answers the need to print, transfer, and re-capture large amounts of data inexpensively, on the spot with one's cell phone camera. It can exchange complete data files (such as text, numerics or binary) and encode graphics, addresses, URLs, fingerprints, shipping manifests, instructions, medical information, and much more. It is used to document and label assets, inventory, parts engineering data, and safety data. It provides a powerful communications capability - without the need to access an external database. For virtually no incremental cost, you can add a QRCode symbol to the documents and labels you are already printing.
Think of QR Code as an independent database with complete freedom of movement, traveling together with a person or on an item, object, package, form, document, badge, card, or label. It does what wired networks can't: allows you to do: immediately access your data regardless of location. Furthermore, if your scanner is a camera phone, it can immediately link a physical object to its online presence.
Because QR Code is a machine-readable method of transporting data, it eliminates time-consuming and error-prone manual data entry. It functions as a paper-based computer memory that can be written once and read over and over again. As a universal machine language, it communicates with all host operating systems. QR Code encodes full ASCII, numeric, Kanji, or alphanumeric data and it uses sophisticated error correction algorithms to keep intact 100 percent of the data - even when as much as 30% of the symbol is damaged. It's self-verifying, so data errors can be detected and data integrity maintained.
Unlike some new technologies, QR Code doesn't require users to learn different procedures, or invest in new hardware and software. A QR Code solution can be added with little change to current applications and it can make use of existing printers and other equipment.
QR Code is compatible with all the same printers used to print 1-D bar codes, including laser, thermal direct, thermal transfer, ink jet and others. You can print on a wide variety of materials-paper, cards, labels, plastics, metals, cloth, and others. You can even fax QR Code symbols, and post them online.
(Portions adapted from Wikipedia article linked in the sidebar.)
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