CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phpbarcodeqr-code
Tsundoku
Tsundoku

Reputation: 9408

When generating barcodes, is there a limit on the number of characters?

I have to develop a system that generates barcodes that will be printed and was wondering if there's a limit to the number of characters of a barcode? I intend to make this using PHP, also would it be better in some way to use QR codes?

EDIT

I want to do this barcodes for a system that will stor different types of shoes but since there are lots of variations to the shoes I require some more characters, but I think I can use hexadecimal numbers to create the barcodes (not sure if this is possible I'm looking into it)

Upvotes: 2

Views: 9274

Answers (2)

Alix Axel
Alix Axel

Reputation: 154543

All barcodes have some limit on the number of characters (or, most commonly, digits) they can represent - you wouldn't expect any kind of barcode to hold an infinite amount of data, would you? ;)

There are many kinds of barcodes, some even have variable lengths.

Emitting barcodes is not as simple as you may think, you'd probably have to:

  • use a checksum algorithm
  • follow the predifined "namespaces" (ISBN comes to mind)
  • register your own namespace with GS1 or a similar regulating body

QR Codes and Semacodes are two-dimensional, this makes it harder to scramble the data they hold and I'm almost sure they are not regulated, but they are also a bit harder to generate.

Some more information about what (and why) you want to do would be helpful, otherwise you probably won't get any decent answers.

Some food for thought:

  • will these barcodes be used internally? if not, how will you make sure your barcode isn't misinterpreted by another product which happens to share the same code?
  • I might be wrong, but you can only use digits (and maybe X for the check digit) with the GTIN family of barcodes - more importantly, why would you need more than the 0-9 charset? even a 8-digit barcode provides 7^10 (282.475.249) different codes... Do you really have that many shoes?
  • have you considered generating Semacodes instead? They allow direct URL routing and can be read by most cellphones nowadays - wouldn't such a system be enough for your needs?

Upvotes: 4

deceze
deceze

Reputation: 522076

Of course there's a limit on the number of characters. Normal barcodes can usually encode somewhere around 12 digits or a handful of bits of data. Two dimensional codes can typically store a few thousand bytes of data. This all depends on the type of barcode/matrix code you choose. And this most likely depends on who will read these codes.

Here's an overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barcode#Types_of_barcodes

Upvotes: 3

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