[Info-vax] how to display bar code label on a session from a "text"

[John Wallace]

On Aug 20, 11:16 pm, "Richard B. Gilbert" <rgilber... at comcast.net>
wrote:
> ed_lin wrote:
> >  We are running Alpha vms 7.3-2, our factory floor use KEA! 340 on
> > windows environment to run vms based application,  our floor
> > supervisors would like us to generate barcode label on the screen so
> > technician can use bar code gun  to scan the label to reduce input
> > error,  they prefer 2D labeling scheme, but I would be happy if we can
> > even produce code 128 or code 39 on the screen, does any one know how
> > to translate a 'given' text string to bar code label on the vt
> > emulated screen?   Your help will be highly appreciated.
>
> I don't recall EVER seeing or hearing of a video terminal with a barcode
> font!
>
> Printers, yes!  Video terminals no!!
>
> If the data on the screen is needed by another program, there are other,
> and better, ways to get the data to the second program.


You could probably get ReGIS to do some kind of bitmap graphics to do
a barcode or even a 2D label, but it would probably have to be Do It
Yourself. Even if the emulator supports ReGIS, there's still the minor
challenge of finding something which will read it off the screen - as
has been pointed out, the barcode readers they already have are most
likely intended to reflectively read printed codes rather than read
something off a screen.

But since the host program will have to be modified anyway to make the
"barcode font" thing work, why not see if there is a 'proper' way of
doing this?