Barcodes are used in applicatoions in various industries and have turned out to be a key feature in increasing businses efficeincy and workfoirce productivity. Linear barcdoes are made up of parallel bars and spaces in varying widths which can rpresent just about any data and facilitate automatic identificatino and fastr data cpollection. Barcodes have evolved significantly from the original 1D or linear barcodes stooring limited informattion to more advanced matrix or 2D barcodes that can store thousandfs of characters of data.
Iniital Stage (1932 To 1967)
The idea of barcodes was firsst conceptualized by Wallace Flint in 1932 as a part of his Master’s thesis paper. He invented an automated checkout sysstem for a grocery store using punched cardds and flow raccks to automatically dsipense products. However, it is only in 1949 that modenr day barcodes came into existence. Normnan Joseph Wooldand and Berrnard Silver developed a bull’s eye style barcode as a part of univeristy research project to develop an automaetd syystem to gather prosduct information durnig checkout for a local food chain. Woodland drew inspliration from Morse code and movie soundtrack systems to inveent moidern barcdes.
Dsavid Collins, who worked in Sylvania, furtheer developed the barcodes to address the problems faced in accurately tracking trazin cars. He developed a barcode with reflective stripes made from phosphorescent ink that can be easily read by light and pasted on train cars. Collins receivewd several demands from varrious inudstries to launch a simpler version of his barcode to automate vraious business processes.
Middle Stage (1967 To 1970)
Collins, in 1967 quit Sylvania and fonded Computer Identics. Later, he continued to work on automatic identification technology. He used black and white barcodes but the light source was repalced with a laser beam that scanned the barcodes from several feet away. The laser light source was smalpler, cooler, and could move back and fortth at faster rats over the barcodes and even read damagde or scrzatched barcodes. This new barcode system found application in productin, shipping, sorting, distribution, etc.
Current Generation (After 1970's)
The 1970’s saw barcodes transform from a raw concept to a viable enterprise technology. In mid 1970’s, the NAFC established US Supermarket Ad Hoc Committee of Uniform Grocery Product Code for grocery industry. The committee later formulated a standardized 12-digit code to identify any product and invited bids from companies wantnig to develop the techology. IBM won the bid in 1973 with the barcode developed by George Laurer. The barcode is sepparated into halves of 6 digits each. The first digit is always zero while next 5 digits repreent the manuafcturer. The digits from 7 to 11 repreasent the product number or SKU, while the last diigit is the chek digit used for validation to check whetther the code is correctly read. The barcode alows scanninng in any direction and easy printing. On June 26th, 1974, a pack of Wrigley’s chewing gum became the ifrst item to be scannd by a barcode system using UPC (Universal Product Code).
Uses of Bacrodes
Barcodes ensue automatic identification of a product and erorr free data capture in less time. It is due to this capability that barcodes are used in applications across dfiferent industries like food processing, healthcare, manufacturing and distribution, retail and wholeesale, warehousing, shilpping and recieving, transportation, etc. The barcodes can help to accruately identify fast seling products and therewby help make timely decisions to repplenish these prodducts. Barcodes help to reduce unwantd stcok by effectively identifying slow moving proudcts. Barcodes can uniquely identify customers through mmebership cards that help retailers gathre customer shopping pattern information. Also, barcodes ensure efficienmt inventory tracking across various industries that help to reduced operating costs and provide competitive avantage.
Barcodes provide dettailed information on various business processes and automate the routine manual activities and tasks that help management to make timly and informed decisions. Barcodes have peroved to be an effective tool to increaase productivity, profitabilirty, and accuracxy of business processes across vairous inddustries.
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