inventory - barcode

inventory

EAN-Barcode and PZN-Barcode

The EAN barcode is a worldwide system for the unique identification of articles via a barcode, the PZN barcode does the same for medical articles and medicines. If you do not want to use the barcodes, you can configure them in the Stock Manager away-configuration.

The Inventory Manager offers in 4 places the possibility to call up the barcode scanner of the mobile phone/tablet by clicking on the button to scan an article:

  1. On the start page : after recognition of the barcode, the corresponding article is called up - as stock, if it is available, or as product, if it is known. Since the article must be held in the hand for scanning, it is assumed that it is to be processed as stock or newly created as such if it was previously unknown.
  2. On the page of the stock data processing : if the article text for a new product should be inserted automatically via the barcode.
  3. In the detailed search : if you want to search for an article (or several articles one after the other) in your own stock (no internet access takes place).
  4. In the stock list, if it is generated by barcode scanning in the detailed search and should therefore be extended in this way.

The server of the stock manager has its own barcode database with > 1 million records. If a barcode is scanned that is not yet known to the app on the mobile phone, it automatically makes a request to its own server to get the corresponding text very quickly.

If the barcode is not yet known to the user, the barcode must be searched for. This is done automatically via queries to some other publicly accessible barcode databases, but some of them have longer response times (the process can be aborted if necessary if it takes too long). If even these queries are not successful, the article text belonging to the barcode must be entered manually once. This text is then not only learned by the mobile phone and its group, but also by the own server.

The self-learning function of the server works both if the answer came from a foreign database (to get the answer faster in the future) and if a barcode text was entered manually. Even if a user corrects a barcode text because it was incorrect (unfortunately this is not so rare), the server learns the correction into its database, and it is available to all users.

The scanning of the barcode itself is done by an additional scanner app. The standard app used for this is the ZXing app, which is not the most beautiful, but it is ad-free and mostly correct. However, you can also specify in the settings that the barcode scanner is to be selected, so that all scanner apps can be used that adhere to this ancient first (and to date only) standardized scanner interface from ZXing.

There are almost no barcode scanner apps left that stick to this interface. That's why you should normally not make the scanner app selectable, because then a scanner app is automatically installed with the first scan attempt, which is known to work, does not request unnecessary permissions, is free of charge and ad-free when used with the Stock Manager.

Furthermore, an external Bluetooth barcode scanner can also be connected. This costs additional money, but is much faster and more accurate in scanning, since it usually works with a laser scan. An external barcode scanner does not need its own additional app.

If a barcode is not readable, you can also enter it manually. To do this, press the barcode symbol for a long time - then an input field opens.

The Stock Manager can also be used with text-oriented barcodes such as Code 128 or QR-Code . This must be enabled in the settings under 'accept any barcode'. But you should only do this if you really want to use other barcodes than EAN-13 and PZN, because then the checks for 'correctness' of the barcode will be switched off. All non-EAN and non-PZN barcodes are treated as private barcodes and will not be compared with any database. The barcode content itself is then the name of the product.

There is also a special interface for private EAN barcodes

This is an otherwise free area in the EAN13 barcodes, which you can use in the Stock Manager for your own products without colliding with other users, i.e. for homemade jam, homemade frozen food etc. These barcodes remain in your own group and are not transferred to the global barcode database.

There are 10 files with 100 barcodes each from this area in the form of zipped graphic files for free use, e.g. for embedding in Word (or editing in a graphics program) and then printing as a separate label with barcode:

 

https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN1.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN2.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN3.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN4.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN5.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN6.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN7.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN8.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN9.ZIP
https://vorrat.sebag.de/eanprivat/EAN10.ZIP

 

The barcode function is part of the Pro version of the Inventory Manager, without it you can save a maximum of 20 items with barcode to try out the function before buying.