Industrial Grade Barcode Scanning w/ an Apple iPad USB barcode scanner and camera connection kit
I was pondering the means of how to scan barcodes with an iPad for a while.
Today I found a really cheap solution. Just connect a stock USB keyboard barcode scanner via the camera connection kit USB connector to the iPad, and you’re done.
Now you can scan your book EANs for librarything or other things like price searches. But
as I’m currently working on some iPad business applications – those would benefit even more from this setup.
Normally you would go with an quite expensive (300-700 USD) bluetooth barcode scanner (one of those that is accepted by the iPad as a keyboard).
Now you can scan whatever barcodes your scanner is configured for (EAN, UPC, CODE128, CODABAR,I3OF9). Those USB scanners are also able to send prefix and postfix key strokes in addition to the barcode itself and also other optional information like the barcode type. All that can be used by your app to process the barcodes.
Another alternative that came up today is to use the iPod touch 4G as the barcode scanning device (creating an App that scans the barcodes with the typical barcode SDKs like redlaser or Big In Japan/Shop Savvy).
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I watched this video on youtube, and thought it was awesome, I went out a bought a camera connection kit and a new Symbol LS2208, hoping to have the same success you had in the video.
However when I plugged in my USB scanner it said “The Connected USB device requires to much power”… I am using an IPAD 2 ver4.3.2(8H7), I was hoping you would be able to me what version of IOS you are running and what USB scanner model you are using.
Thanks in advance!
Unfortunately Apple dropped support for that with iOS 4.2 this is very annoying you can’t use power drawing USB devices anymore on the camera connection kit. Sorry :(
Will it still work with ipad 1? If so, what USB scanner model did you use? Thanks Cynthia
Unfortunately Apple dropped support for that with iOS 4.2 this is very annoying you can’t use power drawing USB devices anymore. Perhaps it works with a self-powered scanner.
The software scanning method (Redline etc.) is too slow and read failure prone for any application that could be considered ‘industrial grade’. Has anybody tried putting a powered USB hub between a usb scanner and a ipad/iphone with connector kit?
Not that I know of, would be an interesting approach.
There are also other scanners which pose as bluetooth keyboards and hook so into the iOS input stream.
Hi,
is it possible to use the “internal” keyboard at the same time ?
Jusr imagine that I need to take the product number with the barcode reader and enter a qty with the internal keyboard.
Thanks
No, unfortunately not.