NLS-Glossary

A numeric-only bar code type, in which each character is composed of seven elements: four bars and three spaces. CODABAR is currently used in a variety of applications such as libraries, medicine, and overnight package delivery. Also known as USD-4 code, NW-7, and 2 of 7 code, it was originally developed for retail price-labeling use.

This code was invented 1972 by Monarch Marking Systems for retail purposes. In 1977 the American Blood Commission defined Codabar 2 as standard symbology for blood banks (=ABC Codabar). The characters “A”, “B”, “C”, and “D” are useable as start or stop characters only. The barcode uses 2 element-widths and 4 different start/stop characters (A, B, C, and D). These start/stop characters can be utilized for additional information – e.g. "B1234B". The print ratio should be in the following range: 1:2 -1:3 (Pr >= 2.25:1). Since the symbology is “self-checking”, there is no established check sum method. The symbology is also known as Code 2 of 7, NW-7, ABC Codabar, USD-4, Monarch, Code-27, Ames code, or Rationalized Codabar. The “rationalized version” uses 2 different element widths in spite of the original symbology, which used 18 different element widths (Standard Codabar).

The term "code" refers to the actual data that is contained in the arrangement of lines and spaces or squares and spaces. This data can be nearly anything: part number, manufacturer ID, transaction code, location code, expiration date, and so on. Data can be numeric, alphabetic, or alphanumeric. The encoded data can be used by a computer to look up additional information about the item in a database, such as price and description.

This is a variant of Code128, which uses character set (subset) A. It is suitable for encoding upper case characters + ASCII control sequences. It switches to other Code128 subsets when required.

This is a variant of Code128, which uses character set (subset) B. It is suitable for encoding lower & upper case letters. It switches to other Code128 subsets when required.

This is a variant of Code128, which uses character set (subset) C. It is suitable for encoding digits. It switches to other Code128 subsets when required.