Hi, I've never used any of your products, but I'm trying to find a barcode scanner to use in my bookshop on a mac. I'm running a book-selling specific software suite and want to convert all the computers to macs, but I'm finding it difficult to get a barcode scanner which will work with them. Which brings me to my 2 questions:
1. Can the iSight barcode scanner work independantly of your software (ie without Book/DVD/CD/Gamepedia)?
2. Will the iSight barcode scanner work with other software?
Using iSight Barcode Scanner with other programs
The iSight barcode scanner is open source. Which means you can integrate it into any other software. Or you could write a simple software that just passes the information on to another software via AppleScript. The current project doesn't do much apart from scan and place the results in a text view (in debug mode you need to mouse click for it to scan). At a professional level I would not recommend using the iSight; the external version probably works very well as you can use it like a wand, but why spend the money for an iSight when any tethered scanner should work well with Macs.
The two computers I'm looking to use them for are Macbooks (currently used for account keeping, etc, but I want to use them for stock management as well), so they already have the built-in iSight, and a tethered or wireless scanner would require spending money. Our local POS guy has lent us the most "universal" wired USB scanner and it doesn't work with macs!? and the only thing I've been able to find on the web that claim to work with macs are wireless Bluetooth scanners.Conor wrote:The iSight barcode scanner is open source. Which means you can integrate it into any other software. Or you could write a simple software that just passes the information on to another software via AppleScript. The current project doesn't do much apart from scan and place the results in a text view (in debug mode you need to mouse click for it to scan). At a professional level I would not recommend using the iSight; the external version probably works very well as you can use it like a wand, but why spend the money for an iSight when any tethered scanner should work well with Macs.
All I need from a scanner is the ability to tranfer the barcode into a text string of numbers corresponding to the barcode.
Anyway thanks for the help.
This post (at the bottom) mentions a 40 dollar scanner not to mention the CueCat that can be found for 10, but I wouldn't know about the performance of a CueCat in a more industrial setting. 
Bluetooth scanners are expensive and the software on the Mac can be iffy. Apparently you need Serialo's Serial Magic to make them work like a tethered scanner with all programs.
Bluetooth scanners are expensive and the software on the Mac can be iffy. Apparently you need Serialo's Serial Magic to make them work like a tethered scanner with all programs.