Barcode Scanner

Point your camera at a package or drop in a photo with the code. On a phone, the barcode scanner through your phone camera is handier: it opens straight into aiming mode. The number is read right in the browser: EAN-13 and EAN-8 from retail products, UPC from American ones, ITF-14 from shipping boxes, Code 128, Code 39 and Codabar from warehouse and library labels. Two-dimensional codes scan as well: Data Matrix, PDF417, Aztec and QR.

The first digits are not the country of manufacture

The prefix names the GS1 national organization where the number was registered. Manufacturing moves around while the number stays the same, so a product with a Russian prefix can be made in China. Special cases are shown separately:

• 20–29: a store's internal code; it means nothing outside that store;
• 977: a magazine or newspaper, with the ISSN inside the number;
• 978 and 979: a book, with its ISBN shown next to the code.

A code from a box breaks down into fields

A GS1-128 code or a Russian Chestny Znak marking code holds more than one number: the product code, the batch number, the expiration date, the serial number. Each of these is shown on its own line with a label. The content of a QR code, such as a Wi-Fi password, a contact card or a payment slip, is broken into fields by the QR code scanner, and you can build your own code with the barcode generator.