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Scanning Barcodes with FileMaker Go – Part 1

October 8, 2012 by Anders Monsen 10 Comments

This is Part 1 of a 3-part series.

A smartphone today does far more than make calls. With a variety of apps available we have access to a world of information at our fingertips, or hours of distraction. Productivity is vital from the business side of mobile computing. Reading and storing data is one powerful aspect, but collecting data on the device makes our information interactive. Getting data on to the device quickly and error-free becomes imperative for any business.

FileMaker Go is a perfect tool for storing data on a iOS device like the iPhone and iPad. But, the lack of a physical keyboard makes data-entry a slow and tedious affair. Scanning bar codes or reading magnetic cards like credit cards, drivers licenses, and so forth, enables fast access to data. This three-part article first will discuss the requirements to pull data into FileMaker Go from an iOS device, and then demonstrate two different methods of adding data.

First, your iOS device will require some software and hardware. FileMaker Go is free, though you will need to develop your database using FileMaker Pro on the desktop. To read bar codes I have used two different apps. One, Pic2Shop, is free and performs its task fairly well, though it is limited to scanning one item at a time. CNS Barcode costs $9.99, but adds a variety of features such as multi-scanning, and also can create bar codes.

To read magnetic card strips the cost climbs. You will need a paid iOS app ($15.99), CardSwipe, and a small device that plugs into your iPad or iPhone (this was tested prior to iPhone 5), such as iMag Pro, around $60. With iMag Pro you can run cards through the reader from the context of the CardSwipe software.

The glue that binds the app and FileMaker Go database is called a URI scheme or protocol. When you build your FileMaker app (you’ll have to wait for part 2!), you create scripts that call the iOS app with their URI scheme. In that URI scheme you then have a callback action to FileMaker using its URI scheme, indicating the database name and the script to run.

With the exception of Pic2Shop, you must pay for the companion app. In part 2, we’ll switch over to FileMaker and see how to set up the database, and how to pull in the data without typing a single character by scanning a barcode. Part 3 will cover reading information from magnetic strips, such as drivers licenses or credit cards.

Filed Under: Barcodes Tagged With: CNS Barcode, FileMaker 12, FileMaker Go, Magnetic stripe

Comments

  1. Jane Gordon says

    October 10, 2012 at 9:34 am

    So happy to read about the barcodes! Will you cover printing the barcodes?
    For already existing records I was planning to print the barcode labels on sheets of 30; but I was wondering about creating the barcode and then printing it on a single lable (like DYMO) as each item is entered. This might help with instantly matching the barcode label with the item, rather than wondering which of the 30 labels on the sheet it belongs to. What do you think?

    Reply
    • Anders Monsen says

      October 11, 2012 at 9:14 am

      Jane, good question, but in this series at least I’m only planning on scanning in barcodes to grab their information and create new records in FileMaker. So, if a barcode is an ISBN number, the process I will describe shows how to set up a database that can read this number.

      Reply
  2. Rick says

    October 21, 2012 at 12:38 am

    Fantastic… When is part 2 available? Furthermore, will this work in FM pro 12 using FM Go 2? I have a working script for FM 7 / Go 1, but am unable to get it working with the latest version.
    I also look forward to the muli scanning section – this would really help our business.

    I eagerly await part 2!

    Rick

    Reply
    • Anders Monsen says

      November 8, 2012 at 9:36 am

      Rick, I posted part 2 this morning. This was developed with FileMaker 12 and FM Go 12, so all that code is native to the latest FileMaker and FileMaker Go. There are some changes in how the URL is written in FM Go 2. Hope the examples can help with converting your FM 7/Go 1 code.

      Reply
  3. charles says

    April 27, 2013 at 5:28 am

    Hi
    We recently introduced a scanner for drivers licenses that works great with FileMaker. In fact we are moving all our software from ce SQL to FileMaker. See the only id scanner for filemaker at http://www.idwedgebt.com. Watch videos showing iPad FileMaker app at bottom of the page. We will have a simple FileMaker demo db up shortly.
    Regards
    Charles

    Reply
  4. Kyle says

    May 27, 2013 at 4:47 am

    Build qr code 2D barcode in FileMaker Pro with a Native qrcode generator plug-in extension.

    Reply
  5. Mark says

    June 28, 2013 at 3:07 pm

    Just wanted to point out that Flixoft now has a free app (Browscan) that provides FileMaker GO barcode scanning URI scheme integration through both the on-board camera and/or a high speed external laser barcode scanner attachment Flixoft developed for Apple devices.
    http://flixoft.com/filemaker

    Reply
    • Anders Monsen says

      July 2, 2013 at 2:58 pm

      Very nice! They have some good documentation and an example file. Thanks for pointing this out.

      Reply
  6. will says

    December 10, 2013 at 11:02 am

    what happened to part 3? seems like a great series, and since I’m looking at incorporating magnetic stripe data in a database, part 3 is essential to me.

    Reply
  7. Anders Monsen says

    December 12, 2013 at 4:25 pm

    Hi Will, Part 3 is online, but looks like the URL is slightly different – Part 3

    Thanks,
    Anders

    Reply

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