Pendragon Forms Version 5.1

Barcode Scanning Compatibility

Pendragon Forms 5.1 automatically supposrt scanners that use the Symbol Scanning API (Application Programming Interface) and the Intermec Scanning API.

Not all scanners support these API's, and, in fact, not all Motorola/Symbol scanners support them. We currently support the Motorola MC55 and the Intermec CN3 specifically.

However, even if Forms 5.1 doesn't support a barcode scanning solution explicitly, it will often work with other scanning systems by using a scan wedge.

What is a Scan Wedge?

A scan wedge is a piece of software that converts a scanned barcode into typed characters. It gets its name from a hardware wedge, a device that used to be inserted between keyboard cables and a computer to allow barcode wand scanning.)

When a barcode wedge program is running on your mobile device, anything you scan appears like typed data to the program you're currently using. Practically all barcode scanners have this software, and it means that your barcode scanner can can data into any field in which a cursor is blinking and awaiting keyboard input.

The only problem with this approach is that Pendragonn Forms cannot automatically react to a scanned barcode. For example, the SCAN event in the Pendragon Forms scripting language allows you to put the scanned information just where it needs to go (independent of cursor position or state), and to instantly create new records or jump to new screens when a barcode is received.

Tricking the Scan Wedge

By configuring your scan wedge in a special way, you can have Pendragon Forms 5.1 see scanned data as scanned data rather than just typed characters.

To do this, you need to set a prefic and suffix character in your scan wedge software. Most scan wedge software allows you to do this quite easily. When you have selected a prefix and suffix, the scan wedge will send to the keyboard buffer the prefix and suffix with every scanned barcode. Pendragon Forms looks for the prefix, and treats all subsequent characters as incoming barcode characters until it sees the suffix.

By default, the prefix character is ASCII character 182, which in most character sets is the paragraph symbol: ś.

The suffix should be the carriage return (ASCII 13).

If for some reason you cannot enter ASCII 182 as a prefix character, you can change the prefix character recognised by Pendragon Forms using the following script:

SETPARAM SCANWEDGEPREFIX n

where n is the character code. Of course, you will want to choose a prefix that will not likely be typed by your users. For example, the tilde (~) character often makes a good alternative:

SETPARAM SCANWEDGEPREFIX 126