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Technology

Free Barcode Reader From Radio Shack 241

Posted by CmdrTaco from the free-and-hackable dept.
Skyhawk128 writes: "I was in my local Radio Shack yesterday, and as I was checking out, the manager offered me a free barcode scanner to use with their new catalog. By hooking up the scanner to your PS2 keyboard port and installing their software (Windows only) you can scan the bar codes found on most pages and be taken a web page with expanded information about that product. They claim to be able to scan the bar code on all sorts of things (i.e.- UPC codes on food, etc.) I have been too busy playing with the scanner in Notepad to install the software, but I thought this gadget might be of interest to other geeks." Several folks have confirmed that you can get a free barcode reader if you're into it. P'raps a SANE module shall soon follow? [Note from timothy:] Not all RS locations are giving them out yet -- the nearest one to me, despite telling me otherwise on the phone, refused to give me one until they had the new (bar-coded) catalogs in stock. That's at Chatham Station shopping center in Howard County, MD.
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Free Barcode Reader From Radio Shack

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  • Finally!!! (Score:3)

    by stefanlasiewski ( 63134 ) <slashdotNO@SPAMstefanco.com> on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:08PM (#835278) Homepage Journal
    A product that's can tell me more about RS merchandise then most Radio Shack employees!!!

    "But sir, there's no such thing as a 'cpu fan'." (From 1998)

    "Why does your motherboard need a battery? You plug it in to the wall... What do you mean by 'CMOS'?"


  • A really good friend of mine would put barcodes on all of his floppies. Then had a Turbo Pascal program (this was a while ago mind you, back when we used floppies). He could just click on a floppy and a norton-command looking dialog would pop up and show him what was currently on the disk, according to the database. Then he just updated the database before removing the disk. It sure beats rewriting labels a dozen times on floppies you reuse frequently.

    Personally I would put them on all my items, then click on them when I loaned them to friends. Except to see a loan database for GTK+ when I get one of these. Also putting them on my many systems and all the hdds, pci cards, etc. would make keeping track of my hardware and where it is a bit easier.

  • Yeppers, folks, it's a serial number. We've got two that we're making comparisons of.


    Code39 1 23 1 23 1 23
    .ahb6. C3nZ CNjY CxfX. #000 111 222
    .ahb6. ChbW D3D3 DNz2. #333 444 555
    .ahb6. Dxv1 Dhr0 E3T7. #666 777 888
    .ahb6. ENP6 #999
    .ahb6. aGic aqeb aaaa. #aaa bbb ccc
    .ahb6. bWCh bGyg bquf. #ddd eee fff
    .ahb6. baqe cWSl cGOk. #ggg hhh iii
    .ahb6. cqKj caGi dW8p. #jjj kkk lll
    .ahb6. dG4o dq0n daWm. #mmm nnn ooo
    .ahb6. eXmt eHis erer. #ppp qqq rrr
    .ahb6. ebaq fXCx fHyw. #sss ttt uuu
    .ahb6. fruv fbqu gXSB. #vvv www xxx
    .ahb6. gHOA grKz z2DN. #yyy zzz $$$
    .ahb6. BgXS y2nJ zMzM. #/// %%%
    .ahb6. AgHO BM5U Bw1T. #+++ --- ...

    SNs:

    .C3 n Z C3 n Z C3 n X E3 n Z E3 n Y CN n X
    0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 8 0 0 8 0 1 1 0 2

    .C3 n Z C3 n Z C3 n X E3 n Z Dh D 0 CN n X
    0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 8 0 0 7 4 7 1 0 2

    .ahb6.bWChbGygbquf.

    .ahb6 Code 39 ?39
    .aaer Codabar CRR
    .CNf7 Code128 128
    .fHmc UPC-A UPA
    .fGj2 UPC-A(5) ?15
    .fGjX UPC-A(2) ?12
    .fHmg UPC-E UPE
    .fGz2 UPC-E(5) ?55
    .fGzX UPC-E(2) ?52
    .bNjW EAN/JAN13 ?13
    .bNb2 EAN/JAN13(5) ?35
    .bNbX EAN/JAN13(2) ?32

    Note that it does Code128, so it does handle the
    complete ASCII character set, we believe. The question marks above are probably lower-case letters.

  • Okay, so who is going to be the first person to post a scannable image of the DeCSS code in barcode?

    (Didn't DDJ or one of the other early computer magazines try running a few issues with progam source (or was it binary?) printed in some sort of barcode, many years back?)

  • Java-based scanner drivers for Linux (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    If this is a typical scanner, then there are Java-based JavaPOS [javapos.com] scanner drivers available for Linux.

    Last year, a team, including myself, integrated scanners using these drivers running on Java/Linux.

    The article says that the software is for Windows-only (most likely OPOS), but with these Java-based JPOS drivers, the cuecat can be ported quickly to Linux.

  • From the web site:
    -=-=-
    :CueCat technology allows for special incentives to be offered based on demographics. The more information you provide, the greater the rewards. Tell us what you like, and we'll give you what you want.
    -=-=-

    More Info for better targeted marketing! No thanks!

    TAG - Your it!
  • It's like his own personal Holocaust. And to think people died trying to escape what he has voluntarily performed upon himself.

    Actually, I believe the tattoed serial number was the least of the holocaust victim's problems. So what if someone thinks a barcode is a cool tattoo? It is not as if they are forced to work until their death...

  • PowerZone card with your purchase of 5 12-packs of D batteries.

    Is this like the old Radio Shack Battery Club Card?

    Of course, my other favorite childhood memory of RS was going in and typing this program on the TRS-80 Model 1 (man, I really wanted one of those things...):

    10 Print "Radio Shack Sucks!!!"
    20 Goto 10

    Probably the first program I ever wrote.

  • If I got a treat for holding the magazine up, or scanning the barcode in, the company would certainly have one foot in the door as far as attracting my attention.

    I'm thinking Pavlov(sp?) and the canine here.

  • Scanner returns an ID number -- privacy concerns (Score:3)

    by __roo ( 86767 ) on Wednesday August 23, 2000 @07:51AM (#835287) Homepage
    I threw together a little quick and dirty script to decode the scanner output [razorwire.com]. But while I was doing it I noticed that the scanner sends back three things: the barcode, a code type (i.e. UPC, ISBN, etc.), and a long number that's always the same. Is this some sort of ID or serial number? Does anyone else find that creepy?
  • I have an idea for something more useless than the on-screen keyboards that you click with your mouse .. A print out of UPC codes for a full qwerty keyboard. Simply plug up your amazing :Cue Cat and scan away! I gurantee at least a rate of 3 papercuts a minute! :)

    ---
    Rob Flynn
  • Adds a whole new meaning to the term "CAT scan".

    A mouse and a cat on my desk? What's next, a dog? (Oh, that's Windoze. Never mind.)

    (I'm in a strange mood this morning...)

  • More devices like this out there (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    There's an alternative over at http://www.qode.com/

  • It'd be cool if someone can reverse-engineer the CueCAT for normal barcode scanning...

    If the CueCAT is a standard wedge barcode decoder, I'm sure someone can hack their way around the software to extract the desired barcode data...

    OTOH, if the "wedge" only captures the raw barcode bitmap, and requires the "CueCAT driver" to decode the barcode, someone has to write a barcode decoding algorithm...

    FWIW, I wrote a Code 39 and Interleaved 2 of 5 decoder in college... It does NOT decode UPC's, though. If you're interested, you can get it here. [joechiu.com]

    The source-code zip-file has a password: "timeline". The password is there because I normally release it as "postcard-ware"... (A little obnoxious, I know, but I've gathered some beautiful postcards from all over the world for this... And, really, anyone could have asked me to e-mail them the password, and I would.)

    Please be gentle! It's old sleepless-newbie-student C code, but it did work. If someone can spend time to port it to Windows and the CueCAT, that'll be really cool... I don't have the time right now. :-(

  • Actually, for grocery shopping, symbol (http://www.symbol.com) makes a bar code scanner (CS2000). You can presently use it at IGA [iga.net] and other grocers at mybutler.com [mybutler.com] to scan product bar codes (or printed bar coded shopping lists) to order your weekly supplies.

    CS2000 has a documented SDK. We have developed a java software to interface the device to any web site (via HTTP). Overall the interface to such devices is pretty simple. Unfortunately these devices connect to the computer via the COM port, which limits the use (pc only) and requires the device to be tethered to a computer.

    The device is also useless without a serious database of codes (UPC or other in the case of cuecat) since the device can only return the information that it has read (ie. the bar code numbers). Checkout barpoint [barpoint.com] for what they claim is a database of 100 million UPC.

  • I sure hope you didn't waste any money on "collage" "sence" it "dosn't" look like it helped you very much.

    See, this is funny. Why don't you moderate it up? I would if it were me. oy vey.

    ----------

  • ...will not sleep tonight...
  • I work at an Ice Skating Rink and I am one of the DJ's there. My friend (Also a DJ) and I have been considering this idea ever since I saw that ad in Wired 8.09 (pg 129). If we could have a list of songs that have barcodes on them, we could just have the :CueCat sitting next to it and people could just scan their requests. The MP3's would be either named the acutal code that the :CueCat spits out or just the decoded UPC's. Winamp would read them in and then automagically add them to the playlist. But I have two questions, 1: Can the :CueCat read any text in a barcode? 2: Are there any other (read: better) ways to do this? Also, has anyone had any luck with stores in the Escondido, CA area. We have 4 Radio Shacks but I have only gone to one any they didn't mention the cat.
  • According to their stock statement, they plan on distributing about 50 million units by '01.
  • Radio Shack is doing this for the coolness factor this brings to them.
  • - Split blocks on the dots
    - Do a 4->3 binhex-like decoding with the table [a..z][A..Z][0..9][+-]. Drop any incomplete byte
    - Xor each value with 67
    - Print as ascii

    The first block is some kind of serial number, the second the type of barcode (UPA, C39, 128...), the third the barcode itself.

    OG.
  • I live in Europe but by my calculations it should be August 24th by now (see timestamp above) even if the "International Dateline"(TM) has rolled over a couple of longitudes (or should that be lattitudes? I forget)

    ---
  • Wired magazine said that every subscriber would be getting one in their October issue. It's the exact same thing, too. A lot of the new Wired ads will have those little barcodes so when you swipe them, your browser will open to the site of the advertiser. I don't quite know what good that will do... I'll already have the ad.
  • My social studies (PC way of saying history) teacher from 8th grade has the barcode/upc for poptarts tattooed on his forearm. All the had to do was walt up to a barcode scanner, swipe hsi arm over it, and poptarts rung up.

    Mark Duell
  • I haven't gotten my development machine close to where the cat is still sitting in its bag, but here's how I'm planning to tackle this in Windoze:

    SetWindowsHookEx allows a procedure to snag the message queue. Setting the first parameter to WH_KEYBOARD lets you grab keyboard messages.

    The Keyboard Hook routine, KeyboardProc, gets the virtual-key code, the scan code -- which is OEM dependent, a code indicating it's not on the main keyboard, and some other useless flags.

    Once I know what the scan code is, and what v-key codes are used for their 'fake' barcode values, it should be possible to

    (a) swallow the serial number
    (b) keep the context of first, second, third digit
    (c) translate the code type (optional?)
    (d) translate to the real barcode value

    Dunno if this works under NT/2000, and likely things are different under various Unices.

    Joel

  • From The Radio Shack website: "Simply use :CueCat to swipe a product code in advertising or catalogs, and :CueCat will link you instantly to a relevant Web page data at RadioShack.com." Ok, this is admittedly kinda cool. However, a problem will possibly arise if any other companies want to implement a similar interactive catalog. Scenario: Radio Shack patents :CueCat. Other catalog companies start using similar technology. Radio Shack sues. Say hello to legal brouhaha! I wonder if they're planning to let other businesses get in on this in the long run.
  • I am thinking why couldnt this be used for exclusive or underground clubs. My bet is maybe there already are some out there. Imagine standing in line to have your arm scanned. Why stop there why cant i have my credit card information on a tatoo on my arm? Feel free to contact me directly. jtwomley@andrews.edu P.S. anyone know of any other free hardware. Anyone usesing I paq wirlessley?
  • www.nettalklive.com

    It's the TV show which has been using the ":C" for about a year or more now. :)

  • Many possibilities indeed! (Score:3)

    by suwalski ( 176418 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:12PM (#835306)
    I know I'll look at the back of each of my high-tech gadgets and do a quick inventory! Maybe I'll even write a simple program that stores these in some convenient manner.

    However, I'd say a really cool, simple to apply use for these could be to Palms. They have a lot of application there, being portable and wireless. Perhaps I'll write this program of mine on the PalmOS.

    Anyone in? =P
  • I would actually describe yourself as a whiny bitch..
    Business promotions on brick&mortar stores (to use the current buzzword) are af course dependent on the store, but on the Internet, a company would be really stupid (<flamebait>or actually, as introvert as an American company usually is</flamebait>) not to include clients from all around the world. After all, that's what the Internet is for...

    And no, I'm not the poster of the grandparent message.
  • It used to be an early form of 2D barcodes... I think it was called something like the Cauzin strip... Sounded neater in theory than in practice. The decoder was too expensive to bother with, and dot-matrix printers (at the time) has lousy dot density for "hobbyist" use...
  • A typical bar code reader functions exactly like you say. *UNFORTIONATLY*, they decided that want to play games with it. It selectivly garbles the data, and you *MUST* use it on a Windows system using a custom keyboard 'driver'.
  • Incorrect in this case. The driver is required becouse it does a selective garbling of the data.

  • A few of us got it at work. Scanning in the same UPC with two different CATs, shows that the first number is a unique identifier. Same on every scan, but different for every CAT. If Radio Shack is taking down names and addresses (as they always do on every purchase) and scanning in the bar code of the CAT, then they are obviously tracking you.

    Using it for the catalogs, and taking you to their website with their software is actually an awesome idea, and I think it will help them. I just am a bit queezy when they start tracking you too.



    ----------------
  • ...because it needs to be cheap. You can implement a PS2 keyboard with a single PIC.

    I love the new sexy USB/firewire/bwafoodle busses, but I miss being able to wire together some logic straight off my parallel port, and have it do crazy shit no one else was using a computer to do. Like set off fireworks. Damn. I'm 'a' 'splode you!

  • I just called a local Radio Shack (in Waterloo, Ontario), and they didn't know what I was talking about. Sounds like this is just for the Unitedstatesians, at least for now.
  • Two friends of mine and I agreed to tattoo our Social Security numbers onto the backs of our necks as soon as cheap hand-held scanning technology became available. We're one step closer now. Woo hoo!
  • I noticed that it's 'convergence cable' has a passthrough.. am I the only one that thinks EVEYRTHING that can hook up to a TV needs one of these? I'm tired of having to switch my cables on the back ofit...
    ----
    Oh my god, Bear is driving! How can this be?
  • we are afterall talking about a company that up until 1996 (I believe, this is going on horrible memory) still advertised the 80286 Tandy's as a POWERFUL desktop machine ;)
  • And catalogs everywhere cry out in anguish at the loss of privacy and anonymity that slashdot has perpetrated by posting this article.
  • Popular Science magazine has been doing this too except without a barcode reader..
  • Since it goes between the keyboard and the box it's not much use on most portables,

    Most laptops have a PS/2 port that works at the same time as the keyboard.

    Stuff like Palm would need an adapter, but I do remember seeing a PS/2 keyboard adaptor for the Palm.

  • Has anyone ever saw the tv :C yet? What channel? What commercial? Is there any particular network that's following this and using it for 'visit our website for more info' thingies?
    ----
    Oh my god, Bear is driving! How can this be?
  • Do you subscribe to Wired magazine? There's a full-page ad in the current issue that says they'll be mailing these Cue:Cat (whatever) scanners out in November. Since that's when the USB model comes out, I'll bet that all Wired subscribers will get a free USB one in the mail then.

    My first thought was the same as everyone else's: Cool, free hardware! Let's hack it!

    Ped Xing
  • Digimarc [digimarc.com] check it out
  • The fun doesn't stop! You can barcode anything. I plan to tattoo barcodes onto my pets.

    I had some difficulty doing this to my cat, as I had to completely shave him down for the tattoo to go on easily. He didnt seem too happy about this and put up somewhat of a fight.

    But, there's a solution ... I visited my local vet and he agrees with me that I could get my pets de-legged to make tattooing easier--after all, prone animals are easier to tattoo. Once this operation was performed, I managed to barcode all my pets! Now I have a house full of shaved, legless animals with barcodes on their heads which may be scanned so i can link to websites displaying pictures of their appearance before their "modifications" ...

    Cool eh ? !!!! ;-)
  • Back to our Library Discussion [slashdot.org], wouldn't one of these babies work great for keeping track of those books!
  • Wired Magazine is also advertising a way to get the same Cue Cat devices for use with their advertising. What other handy uses might these be put to? When I read the article in Wired, I assumed it was proprietary, but from the sounds of it, they might not be.
  • Am I the only person here who would probably just type the damn URL in, rather than go to the trouble of picking up the thing and scanning the page?

    Hmmm, lemme think for a minute. Type a long URL to a specific resource, or scan a barcode with a pen-like apparatus sitting at my computer? Gee, I dunno!?

    Also, how common is it to read magazines while conveniently next to your computer? I almost never do. That's what the toilet is for, and I'm afraid I don't have a terminal there yet. Am I missing something?

    A brain, maybe?

    How exactly were you planning to visit the URL if you are not next to your computer? And if you are not planning to visit the URL, what the hell are you complaining about?

    Have people been demanding this capability?

    Has that ever been a pre-requisite for creating a new piece of hardware or software?

    The idea is, articles can now reference documents exactly, with long-ass URL's, and their users can just scan the barcodes in to go right to it, instead of having to type them. Hell, Digimarc uses your webcam to view the magazine ad (if known), and redirects you to the place. I personally find the scanner idea easier to use right now.

    The point is, not everyone's a 90-word a minute geek like yourself.

    -thomas

  • Its a... cat (Score:3)

    by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @05:46PM (#835328)
    Long after I've gone to bed the bar code scanner and the mouse will engage in the eternal predator-prey stuggle, running around my shark fin shaped cable modem until they've both tied themselves up with their own cables. I'll wake up and groggily ask my roommates, "Okay who's been fucking with the computer?"
  • for privacy reasons, it's potentially more dangerous, since I don't really think Hostess Cakes needs to know that I saw their ad in Cosmo.

    You're right! Just think of what they could do with such private information!

    Horrors!!

    -thomas

  • There is actually a picture of the "CAT" at radioshack.com [radioshack.com]
  • The idea is to license your version to other people. There are a number of people competing in this "Print to Web" market right now. Time will tell who will come out the winner that will set a standard.

    We're also a player in this field.

  • Stupid (Score:5)

    by jheinen ( 82399 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:16PM (#835335) Homepage
    Pardon my negativity, but this thing strikes me as a supremely idiotic piece of hardware (at least for its intended purpose). I have to plug yet another piece of crap into my machine and, while conveniently sitting by my computer, read dead-tree periodicals and scan the codes in when I see something I like? Am I the only person here who would probably just type the damn URL in, rather than go to the trouble of picking up the thing and scanning the page? Also, how common is it to read magazines while conveniently next to your computer? I almost never do. That's what the toilet is for, and I'm afraid I don't have a terminal there yet. Am I missing something? Have people been demanding this capability? Has the lack of a magazine-computer interface been holding up the adoption of internet technology and impeding the advance of the new economy? This sounds to me like a pure marketdroid invention. No useful purpose, but at least you can slap a brand on it.

    -Vercingetorix

  • :Cat scanner (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I work for RadioShack.
    The official word to the stores was 'start giving them out as soon as you get the new catalogs.'
    Of course the idea is to get you to come into the store and buy something while you're there.
    The current version works with the ps2 keyboard port. (If you have an AT style keyboard you need an adaptor. A USB version is planned for novemeber.) RadioShack made a deal with a company called DigitalConvergence [digitalconvergence.com], the makers of the "Cue Cat". The ":" is their idea.

  • How to get a cuecat without going to RS (Score:3)

    by Bilestoad ( 60385 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:18PM (#835337)
    You don't have to go to a Radio Shack store - in two days you can order one online.

    http://www.cuecat.com/getcat_form.html

    It's usually a waste of time going in there, even if everything was free.
  • I just went to RS and got a couple at noon. They're very light and almost insubstantial. I'm going to take one apart tonight, but my guess is that they used some proprietary hardware and firmware for the scanning. All it takes is a PIC, an LED, a photo transistor and some firmware, for a basic barcode reader. It only decodes a couple of code types anyway, so the firmware can be relatively simple. The whole reader probably costs $3 or less to manufacture, so I doubt they used off the shelf barcoding chipsets.

    Uwe Wolfgang Radu
  • I went to radio shack and bought three (2.95 for the catalog including scanner). Each of them seems to have an ID! Look at the scans!!

    Here are scans of three different products using the same scanner:

    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNn6ENr1CxnX.fHmc.C3DZCxPWCNz2DNv7.
    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNn6ENr1CxnX.aabI.y2nIy2z7.
    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNn6ENr1CxnX.bNn7.C3f6Chj2DNy.

    Here are three scans of the same product using three different scanners:

    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNn6ENr1CxnX.ahb6.eaya.
    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNf2CxrXCxnX.ahb6.eaya.
    .C3nZC3nZC3nYDNj1C3b7CxnX.ahb6.eaya.

    Note the .ahb6.eaya. is always the same. It seems to represent the product. But the .C3nZC3nZC3nYDN******CxnX. is different each time!!

    They might use the indiviual ids to track them! It's like a mac address or something.

    Also, I took it apart. It contains what seems to be an industry standard red-led bar code scanner module. It connects to a pcboard with lots of little surface mount stuff thats over my head.

    Anyhow, lets crack this thing!!

  • ...there's only one problem. That is making your open software the standard.

    The standard software is always going to be the software that the sly people selling the barcode reader stick on the CD which ships with it. Those people are going to be the same people who want to do the advertising, and they are always going to try and stick on their own cheesy, smiley software.

    --- You are a Target Market

  • Make your own bar codes (Score:3)

    by qbasicprogrammer ( 200734 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:31PM (#835366)
    You can make your own barcodes online here [spatula.net].

  • Re:Wired Magazine too (Score:3)

    by OtterSkip ( 127238 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:36PM (#835367) Homepage
    I got a digital camera from Wired as part of the digimarc promotion. It did work, with a few caveats. For example, the camera had to be focused at a point about five inches away, which means if you're using it for videoconferencing, you'd probably have to re-focus it just to see the ad. Also, some ads worked better than others in terms of success ratio, but it really was cool to go to a URL just by holding a piece of paper in front of a camera. The hassel of getting to the point where you could hold the paper up (lanching the software, focusing the camera, adjusting white points, etc) didn't make it worth it beyond the first few ads. Notice now that there are almost no digimarc ads in Wired, at least in the latest issue.

    The cat thing seems like an interesting idea, although I'm a bit upset that it seems to not be USB, and therefore probably not Mac-compatible, and so I'm out of luck (unless I got a USB adapter for it and used it on my iBook which has Linux installed...), although I'll take any free stuff Wired sends me.

    Still, I can't see wholly what the point of it all is. First off, the new media-type companies that advertise in Wired tend to have company.com URLs anyway, and they're not that hard to type in. When I tried the digimark'd ads in Wired, I was hoping for some special payoff given the neat-o way that I got to the site, but I didn't. Both the advertisers and the magazine publishers need to figure out exactly *why* this would be useful, and exploit it. If I got a treat for holding the magazine up, or scanning the barcode in, the company would certainly have one foot in the door as far as attracting my attention.

    The real possibilities come with blending the printed magazine with online content. If Wired stories began to have an online component that you could get to with the gizmo, whatever it was, then there's something truly useful there. And, it could provide a way of verifying that the person viewing the site is a purchaser of the magazine, so online content could be kept from jeopardizing newstand sales.

    Really, when you think about it, if these URL-entering devices were around two years ago, think about what that would have meant for Pathfinder...

    _pete

  • Too many myths (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Disclaimer: Yes, I do have some first hand knowledge of Digital Convergence, it's employees, and it's technology. With that said I am NOT an employee of the company. I'm not really privy to any information that's not already publicly available (and if I were, I wouldn't talk about it anyway)

    There's a lot of people who have responded to this article and drawn the wrong conclusions. I'll dispel a few myths:
    • This is NOT a Radio Shack product. Radio Shack is a primary distributor of the product, yes, but the product is made for and designed by Digital Convergence.
    • Digital Convergence public statements on their business model indicate that they do NOT intend to suddenly start charging for the device. Clearly they intend the product (the one available at Radio Shack) as a way to get eye balls using their system. The revenue stream is clearly on the other end data system (you didn't think all those bar codes were free did you?).
    • Everyone seems to have not noticed the other part of the product. While it appears that Radio Shack is NOT including the audio cable, there are pieces in the software that will listen to the audio stream off your sound cards input source (your TV), and using markers in the, audio take you to certain websites. While there's not may (any) places where the markers are currently being used, it's gonna be nearly impossible to avoid them RSN.
    • Digital Convergence has a pretty strict privacy policy [digitalconvergence.com]. Knowing the people that I know at DC, this policy means business, and will be strictly enforced.
    • There's a USB version on the way. And while, I can't find the text to cite, it's been stated that Windows is not the only OS the Cat will support (via Digital Convergence software).

    It's clear that just from the design of the scanner, that Digital Convergence didn't intend it to be really that hard to reverse engineer the encoding method. That's already been done [jounce.net]. The sourceforge project really is a good start, but ultimately any open source project also needs to be able to ask the questions of the DC database to get it's answers. Why? Well, think about it. Digital Convergence charges companies to store their UPC/ISBN/Whatever bar codes in their database with pointers to the product's website. How long do you think it will take DC to get mean once you start trying to kill their revenue stream? The other side of that is simple. Digital Convergence, would be definition have a large, established database full of bar codes and to whom they belong.

    Now... here's my basic analysis of the datastream, just from playing with the few units I've got lying around (note that I'm crippled in that most of the units are not the retail version, so it's possible that something changed slightly -- I've only got 1 retail Cat). Note that all the tests I did below were done using a retail kit I obtained from my local Radio Shack.

    The datastream seems to consists of 3 octets, each ending in a period. The first seems to be some kind of serial number. All the kits I have seem to prefix the first octet with 3nZC3nZC3nZ. The rest of the digits seem to be the same encoding method already published. The second octet seem to indicate either the length or the type of bar code. UPCs are "fHmc" ISBN's are "oGen" and the DC Cue's are "aabi", USP tacking numbers are "CNf7", Fedex Labels are "aaer", sort UPC (Coke cans..) are "fHmg". The third octet is of course the UPC symbol.

    Unfortunately, I can't talk much about the Audio stream, or what the Winders software does over the network. Given what I know, these bits are probably pretty easy to figure out though.
  • I know what I could use it for:

    Making a catalog of my ~two hundred CD's and ~five hundred books. They all have UPC codes on the back and hopefully there's an internet-accessible free database that could be used to return data from the UPC. This could let me quickly build my own little "card catalog", accessible through my own website, and also loaded onto my Handspring. This would help me avoid buying books I already own, and when some book comes up in conversation and I can't remember the exact title, or author, I would be able to find it.

    But there's no way I'm going to type in all that stuff by hand. Running the barcode reader over each book would only take a couple of hours though, certainly worth doing.

    Torrey Hoffman (Azog)
  • This reminds me of the LaserDisc barcode readers. Remember how you could hook them up to your LD player, scan a barcode, and it would jump to a specific place on the disc?
  • I've been trying to tattoo a barcode on my forehead so potential employers can scan it to jump to a website with my resume!!! But the fun doesn't stop there! You can barcode anything. My next step is my pets.

    I had some difficulty doing this to my cat, as I had to completely shave him down for the tattoo to go on easily. He didnt seem too happy about this and put up somewhat of a fight.

    But, there was a solution ... my local vet agrees with me that I could get my pets de-legged to make tattooing easier--after all a prone animal is easier to tattoo. Once this operation was performed, I managed to barcode all my pets! Now I have a house full of shaved, legless animals with barcodes on their heads which may be scanned so i can link to websites displaying pictures of their appearance before their "modifications" ...

    Cool eh ? !!!! ;-)

  • It worked, and I was happy.


    Then I tried to think of something to use it for. And came up empty.

    Reminds me of that free X10 [x10.com] stuff you can get. It works, and it's not a scam, but still .. it's kinda lame. A briefly amusing toy.

    Which does not mean, of course, that I'm not going to run out first thing tomorrow and pick up one for myself. 8^)

    Yep. Free gizmo to plug into some port and make your computer look cooler, thereby attracting the babes.


    ---
  • Not only is Wired Magazine advertising the :CueCat, they're shipping them to subscribers in September. The October issue of the magazine will feature the barcodes.

    I think that the :CueCat is doomed to be a failure, like DigiMarc MediaBridge, but anything that gets me free hardware is good in my book.
    ---
    The Hotmail addres is my decoy account. I read it approximately once per year.

  • Its on page 133. (they need to start numbering EVERY PAGE.. I'm tired of having to flip back 2-3 pages to get a page number...)

  • Thanks Rob (Score:3)

    by voidptr ( 609 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:47PM (#835388) Homepage Journal
    Great. Now 25 Million geeks are going to storm their local Radio Shack (Which most of us would never set foot in otherwise anymore. Admit it.) tomorrow as soon as they open up. We're going to have lines that make opening day of Episode One pale in comparison.
  • Using the keyboard port for imput from a bar code reader is common practice. This is called a wedge interface [csensors.com]. It just types in the code. You do have to be able to print codes in a format that the reader will recognize for it to work for your own applications.

    jinj [jplt.com]: /.,fm,email,others on your alpha pager or text cell phone.
  • Ok, I got mine at the Radio Shack in Des Plaines IL over the weekend and just plugged it in on my Windoze machine.

    The install was long and it asked a bunch of personal questions, but you can skip those. It also had an annoying narrator. One reboot later...it is working.

    So I start scanning every barcode I can find without getting out of my chair. Since my office is always a mess, I had a bunch. My Pepsi can took my to the Pepsico site. Nice. My Highlander DVD took me to something called Ingram Entertainment. Never heard of them. It went downhill from there....

    My WordPerfect 2000 for Linux CD, my KLF CD, my Sony USB memory stick reader, my Star Wars X-wing book (Iron Fist) and my Dexxa mini-mouse all came up as unknown. I also tried it on a stack of D-link products to no avail.

    I guess it will only be useful for the RS catalog, if I keep the thing hooked up.


    Viv
    -----------

  • Ohh! This is perfect! (Score:3)

    by ironman8250 ( 225306 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:53PM (#835397)

    Does anyone know what barcode format it reads?? I know there are several different formats but only a couple in widespread use (UPC labels, etc).

    I'm 90% done with my I-Opener [slashdot.org] mods and this thing will go nicely with my idea of putting it in the kitchen. I'll set up some software so I can scan food items I've run out of and automatically generate a grocery list and maybe transfer it to a palm pilot. Or perhaps I could scan a few things that I do have and plug that into a recipe database and have it spit back out what meals I can make from those ingredients...

    This is in addition to having a convenient place to quickly check mail and get my tech news fix from slashdot of course.

  • "Paper Referrer Stats"

    Sure you can just type in the URL.

    However, with the barcodes, it is possible that they are embedding other information in that barcode besides just a convienent way to get to additional information on the product.

    This probably doesn't apply to the Radio Shack catalog, but for advertising, they could include information identifying which magazine/newspaper, even exactly which issue, the user is scanning.

    This would give Wired and Fortune a darn good reason for footing the bill (see other comments about these two magazines' scanners) for the cost of the scanners. They could show their advertisers how effective advertising in their magazine is. Of course, this doesn't give exact numbers, but they would be able to say "at least" some number of hits to their site were because of this.

    I have no evidence of this being in the barcodes (I have neither barcode scanner nor catalog/ad at this time), but it is a possibility...

  • Open your eyes guys!! (Score:5)

    by Slef ( 8700 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @08:24PM (#835401)
    I can't believe no one sees the big picture here.
    Why would they be giving away bar code readers?
    To make you look at their catalog? Of course not!

    So they start by giving away the bar code readers. If the stuff becomes popular, they will stop giving them away, and people will buy them. But that's not where the big bucks are. It's just good for the scanner factories. And I'm sure they will be happy to let other companies sell Cue:cats

    Think about it: whenever you scan your can of cola or your favourite magazine, your computer connects to Cue:cat, sends the code you scanned (and probably your ID as well, I don't know -- can someone check that?). Then, their server sends back the URL of some webpage.

    Now, here is where they win: if their software becomes popular, their server will be the main gateway of all bar code readers. So if you scan a book, where is it going to go? To Amazon or barnes and nobles? If you scan a DVD, the logical URL would be the corresponding record of www.imdb.com. But do you really think it will ever send you there? They have no reason to set it up that way. So here is their first advantage: they control where you go on the net. And how long before it sends you to a "Pepsi is better" page whenever you scan a can of coke.

    And then, if I am right to suppose that they send your ID with every scan, they can also collect a huge amount of info about you.

    I think the idea of being able to scan a barcode and get a relevant URL is cool. But the interpretation of the code should not be left to one organization only. LET'S REACT!!! We should quickly release a concurrent software for Linux, Windows and Mac, and create an open search engine. The software should be open source so you can check it doesn't invade your privacy. The gateway you use should be configurable so that if you don't like the practices of one, you can switch to another. Ideally, I would imagine a gateway in which users could vote on the best URL for a bar code.

    Let's create this OPEN:Cat FAST, before Radio Shack takes over the world! http://uscan.sourceforge.net is a step in the right direction, now we need to set up the server.
  • I find it interesting that the lawyers speak of "intellectual property rights" rather than the actual rights supposedly being trounced. Is this a patent, copyright, or license case?

    From what I can gather, FBM wrote software that works with their hardware. This violates no copyright law, unless the DMCA somehow figures into it (side beef: the DMCA is not copyright, it is use-right).

    It might be one of those "software patent" or "business plan patent" cases. Do they hold a patent for using a scanner to get information based on a bar code? If so, they might have a legal (though, IMHO, illegitemate) beef.

    Finally, though not likely, they are trying to enforce a license agreement. I don't have one of these scanners, so I don't know what sort of click-through licensing there is. However, these traditionally apply only to the software which is being thrown away here.

    If it isn't any of the above, I figure they don't have a leg to stand on. They might as well have Craftsman sue me for using a claw hammer as a meat tenderizer.

  • Forbes (Score:2)

    by Uart ( 29577 )
    Forbes Magazine distributed those to all of their subscribers. The ads in forbes will now all have barcodes, which when scanned by this will take input the URL of one of Forbes' e-commerce partners. They probably get a cut of the sale too.

  • Re:Not just for windows (Score:3)

    by Chasuk ( 62477 ) <chasuk@gmail.com> on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:57PM (#835426)
    Go to the :CueCat website [cuecat.com] for details on the reader, including the Radio Shack promotion.

    They will send you a :CueCat reader and :CRQ System Software for the cost of shipping (I'm assuming this is for those folks without a Radio Shack nearby). Click here [crq.com] to link directly to the order form. Note that they won't be taking orders until August 24th.

    So far, the software only supports Windows 95, 98, NT 4, and Windows2000.

  • car mp3 player! (Score:3)

    by cybercyph ( 221022 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @08:29PM (#835428)
    i know what im using mine for! print out a list of my mp3s with barcodes next to them. who needs a keypad to type in the track number
  • On the other hand, it's simple for them to encode the URL with better tracking information, rather than the shortest possible domain name that somebody is willing to type. Translating to "I read this ad in the October issue of Wired / Cosmo / whatever" so they can track the "dead tree referer". For marketroid purposes, that is potentially much more valuable, and for privacy reasons, it's potentially more dangerous, since I don't really think Hostess Cakes needs to know that I saw their ad in Cosmo. (To take an impossible example).

    --
    Q: What do you get when a Postmodernist joins the Mafia?

  • Have a look here and here.
    http://uscan.sourceforge.net/upc.txt
    http://www.jounce.net/~maarken/
  • The keyboard connector is a Y connector, so you don't lose anything.

    Also, it looks like it spits out a stream of keys which look something like
    .C3nZC3nZC3nXD3T6ENv1C3nX.ahb6.eaq.
    Where the string startnig with C3 is identical on all barcodes I scanned. My guess it is a serial
    number. The .ahb6. field is likely the type of bar code that was read (since it changes for
    different barcodes). And the .eaq. is the barcode that I scanned (in this case a country code from a seagate cheetah disk: SG for those collecting these things).

    I've been able to read Most barcodes that I've thrown at the thing: Normal product UPC, a book ISBN, the strange codes in the ratshack catalog, a barcode on the seagate disk I was given to install, and the bar codes on a box that some electrical parts came in.

    My guess is that there's a code for these the bar code. It looks like it is 5 or 6 bits per character, encoded in some strange way. If it is 6 bits, then SG is 12 bits, which would imply that each character of bar code delivers 4 bits. If SG is really 24 bits (start S G stop), then we're delivering 8 bits, which seems wrong because I didn't see anything in the control character or
    upper half of the range. So we may be looking at a radix 62 encoding (A-Za-z0-9).

    Anyway, enough musings, I'll bet I've overlooked a pointer to the specs posted elsewhere on this page :-)
  • A friend of mine has a barcode on his arm.

    He rings up as a $.35 pack of JuicyFruit.

    NecroPuppy
  • Once upon a time, I helped set up a new Radio Shack franchise - the barcode reader there simply plugged off a Y-adapter into the AT keyboard port, and when it scanned an item, it simply typed the decimal UPC number out. It's quite likely - especially since it plugs into a keyboard port - that this scanner works the same way. There might be some odd control codes in there, but fundamentally these things represent themselves to the computer as keyboards.
  • I recall seeing in the latest Wired that they were going to send all their subscribers a barcode reader to let them do the same thing with barcoded ads.

    There must be big money in this somewhere. The previous issue of Wired had all the ads encoded with a watermarking technology that supposedly let you hold an ad up to a video camera and extract a URL from it. Even the current issue still has an ad by these video readable ad guys, though this technology sounds too complex and ads a noticable distortion to the ad backgrounds.

    I suppose the next step is to print unique barcodes for every ad in every copy of the magazine / catalog printed, allowing them to track all sorts of interesting things.

    Ain't technology grand?

    G.
  • I'm pretty skeptical about service agreements, like some goofy thing I heard about lately. Buy someone's PC and pay only a couple hundred AFTER you agree to 2 years of someone's service. Yeah, right. When I can get internet service for free or much cheaper anyway. I prefer to pick my own portals, thank you very much.

    Vote [dragonswest.com] Naked 2000
  • Ever play with bar codes? It's fun stuff. Like the time I reverse engineered the student ID barcode at my college, and generated a new one and printed it out with some shareware program and taped it discreetly to my student ID, over the correct one. I could've gotten free meals for a while if my conscience hadn't kicked in 8)

  • Helpful Tip! (Score:3)

    by bunnyman ( 121652 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @07:42PM (#835468)
    If you tell them you have an "older" computer then you can get two free DIN->mini-DIN converters with the device, according to their web site.

  • Oh come on, it's got some use. It's a great piece of kitsch (sp?). 100 years from now it might get high praise on whatever 22nd century manifestation of Antiques Roadshow they happen to have.

  • The way these usually work (and it sounds like this one is the same) is that they just proxy your keyboard connector. Then, if you scan a barcode the device just shoots the numerical form the barcode into your keyboard buffer. To interface you could just write a keystroke filter that looks for barcode formatted numbers.
  • yeah, i worked for radioshack, until 8/20 because now i'm moving for college. anyway, yes, the cuecat is meant for the 2001 catalog. and according to internal memos, they cannot be distributed because the site is/was not operational at that moment. also, internal memos claim that any employee that doesn't get the customer's name and address when giving out a CAT will be terminated. RS knows the value of these things to people like us, so they're keeping track of everyone. the CAT uses a LED, not a laser, and uses a PS/2 passthrough cable to the keyboard (memos give guidephrases in tech support... "remember! cats and mice don't mix, so tell customers to plug it into the keyboard!" as for the USB version, yes one will be available, but NOT publicly. you have to CLAIM you have the compaq presario that only has FIREWIRE & USB... (stupid POS system). the USB versions are ONLY for those customers, since they don't have ps/2, serial, or parallel ports. and all stores have the catalogs, but it's up to the discretion of the salesperson whether or not you get it free. some people (pay is commission based) will require you to buy something over X amount of dollars, where X usually is 10$. yeah RatShack has some issues regarding the intelligence of its employees, but they're going to carry a crapload more of PC equipment instore... a few UPS's, the MS Intellimouse Optical (49.99). check out the catalog. it's a good read while in the bathroom :P -Greg
  • Tomorrow on the news: 'Radio Shack Slashdotted'
  • Now they've got me doing their restock ordering for them!
  • it appears to be a warner brothers home video product. Probably either Contact, or Blade Runner.

    am I close?

  • Great plan, only you have to have already bought one to ever get another... Slowly over the years, as labels show up damaged, you are whittled down to the point where the only foods you can order are canned okra, pineapple teriyaki sauce, and spam.

    =P

    --
    $you = new YOU;

  • Not just for windows (Score:5)

    by Whafro ( 193881 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @05:57PM (#835493) Homepage
    About four days ago, a few people I know and myself cracked the simple cipher the reader uses, so don't bother trying yourself. Just go to this page [sourceforge.net] and see it and try out our PHP beta translator and whatever-er at this page [jounce.net]. If you wanna help, send an email to jackw@users.sourceforge.net and let me know, as this is completely a GPL project designed to make the most out of this reader.

  • Actually, no.

    I've been working on reverse engineering the code they used for a day or so now. Translating ASM back into C after not working with ASM for a few years sucks. :)

    Anyways, they use a method of selectively garbling it based on the length of the UPC and a few other tricks. Without their special keyboard hooked driver DLL, you'll just get gobbdygook back from their cuecat hardware.

    I just hope the fact that this was mentioned on /. won't stop Radio Shack from giving the scanners out. I don't actually have a scanner from the local Radio Shack yet (the code was passed to me by some of the other #kuro5hin regulars who have also been working on this).
    ---
  • I found this in the latest issue of Wired and had a look at the product yesterday or the day before. Since it goes between the keyboard and the box it's not much use on most portables, and even my home PC with it's custom IR remote keyboard can't use it. When it comes with my subscription, I hope it looks cute because it's just going to be decoration, if not land fill.

  • About 8 years ago, I picked up a barcode reader that probably works the same way -- the keyboard plugs into the scanner, the scanner plugs into the kb port, and the scanner simply transmits the barcode as if you had typed the equivalent text. It was in a dumpster near where I was working, and I dug it out, took it home, and plugged it in. It worked, and I was happy.

    Then I tried to think of something to use it for. And came up empty.

    I used it once or twice while working on a project that required printing some barcodes, but other than that, I never really used it.

    So I have to say I'm not sure this will be of much use to anyone, except, perhaps, for the purpose Radio Shack intended it.

    Which does not mean, of course, that I'm not going to run out first thing tomorrow and pick up one for myself. 8^)

  • Other uses for the free barcode scanner... (Score:3)

    by buckrogers ( 136562 ) on Tuesday August 22, 2000 @06:01PM (#835513) Homepage
    Inventory of all your books and CD's. Maybe we can produce a database similar to the CD music databases for books and magazines.

    Cheap Linux based Point of Sale terminal.

    Print up yard sale tags for multiple family yard sales and total up the sales at the end of day by family.

    Inventory tags for a small business.

    For the institutional pharmacy, tag your drugs and tag the patient label and scan in both to ensure that the drug dispensed matches the drug prescribed on the patients' label.

    Use bar coded ID tags at security stations such as convention entrances to see if the individual is allowed to enter the event.

    Anyone else have any other suggestions? I have to go watch "That 70's Show" now or I would thing of some more.

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