Datasheet

C - 1
USER'S GUIDE
Appendix C
BAR CODE
SYMBOLOGIES
This appendix discusses the “symbologies” or bar code standards supported
by the IRISPen Executive software and contains some samples of bar codes the
IRISPen can read with great ease.
The bar height, the width of the narrow bar, the narrow to wide ratio and the
character string the bar code contains are indicated each time. (The narrow to
wide ratio does not apply to all types of bar codes.)
Although some general information is given on the various bar code standards,
this manual does not intend to be a complete catalog of all there is to know about
bar code symbologies.
CODE 39
Code 39 is an alphanumeric, self-checking, variable-length bar code. A char-
acter is defined by five black bars and four spaces; three elements are wide, six
are narrow. There is a leading and trailing quiet zone, a start and stop character
(the asterisk), an optional check character and a gap between the data charac-
ters.
This symbology is sometimes called “3 of 9 code”, and when a check charac-
ter is used even “HIBC” for “Health Industry Bar Code”. It is primarily used
where alphabetic characters are mandatory as you can not only encode the dig-