mnelson@vmsa.oac.uci.edu (03/09/90)
One feature that I would really like to see is a barcode reader built into a calculator. It would be quite nice to be able to pick up a book written for the 48 and suck in the programs without having to deal with any sort of extra peripherals. Since the 48 has both input and out- put photodiodes, would it be feasible to make them work together as a barcode reader? One obvious question is whether the black marks of the code would be discernible from the white background that they are printed on when viewed in the infrared. I'm a little too busy to look for the optical properties of various publishers' media, but maybe somebody else out there has experience in this sort of work. Then, of course, there is the problem of making the ir i/o do exactly what you want, but that doesn't seem like an insurmountable problem. Maybe this is a completely un-doable project, but I can dream, can't I? +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ Matt Nelson, Physics Dept., University of California, Irvine, CA 92717 (714)856-6496 internet: nelson@psroot.ps.uci.edu bitnet: mnelson@uci +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
umapd51@sunb.cc.ic.ac.uk (W.A.C. Mier-Jedrzejowicz) (03/13/90)
I asked Dan Terpak (head of Corvallis' calculator division) about HP 48SX barcode when he was over here in the UK at the HP 48SX introduction. He seemed a little surprised at the idea and said HP had certainly not thought of doing this. As I have published a book with HP-41 barcode, and am chairman of a club which publishes HP-41 barcode in most issues of its journal (8 times a year), I thought this would be an obvious thing to do. Even the humble Psion Organiser uses an (HP!) barcode reader. For the time being I plan to write programs which will let an HP-41 read text barcode then fire it into an HP 48SX through the infrared link. The worst part will be writing a program to convert HP 48SX programs into HP-41 text data, but it would certainly be possible on a PC. Barcode is a MUCH better way to transfer programs included in a book than including a floppy with the book and then having to deal with a/ pirated copies, b/ copies which don't work. HP do not see it this way - to them barcode is for industrial and commercial uses only. Wlodek Mier-Jedrzejowicz, Space Physics, Imperial College, London BITNET: MIER @ SPVA.PH.IC.AC.UK Disclaimer - the above are ideas, not opinions, certainly not those of my employer.