Introduction How to download data from scanner

1. Introduction

1.1How to download data from scanner

The major difference between the PA500 and a standard HPC/PalmPC is barcode input capability. The WinCE Reference Manual contains no information regarding barcode input. This section will introduce the programming structure of the barcode sub-system and the programming utility library for the PA500. Inside the PA500 there is an advanced decoding chip to control SE900 laser engine and to handle barcode decoding. Below is system diagram for the PA500 barcode:

SE950

Laser

Engine

Advanced COM2

Decoder

Chip

CPU

According to the above diagram, the PA500 communicates with Decoder Chip by mean of serial port COM2. Its communication parameter is fixed on 38400,N,8.1. Normally, the Decoder Chip is in sleep mode when COM2 is not activated. When COM2 is activated, the Decoder Chip will start working, and it will decode the barcode “signal” from the laser engine when the trigger key is pressed. After decoding, barcode data and its symbology type will be sent directly to PA500.

Many programmers find it difficult to control the Decoder Chip via programming language alone, especially if they are not familiar with barcode and serial port controls. Because of this, Unitech provides the following utility library and program for the user or application programmer to control the Decoder Chip:

1.Application program “Scan2Key.exe” is a useful application program that can read input data from the laser scanner and then directly input the data into PA500’s keyboard buffer. “Scan2Key.exe” makes barcode data input simple, and can be especially valuable to those programmers not familiar with COM port programming. User program simply reads the barcode data from the keyboard. For barcode symbologies setting, you can run Scanner Setting from Control Panel to define all of supporting symbologies and delimiter.

2.Utility library:

For programming control, PA500 provides USI.DLL to let user control scanner input, symbologies setting and profile controlling. Please refer to 2 for detail API lists.

USI.DLL is Unitech’s new scanner function library on PA500. For backward compatible issue, Unitech still provide Scanner3.DLL and ScanKey3.DLL for existing PT930/PT930SA user to port their software into PA500, but several APIs on Scanner3.DLL and ScanKey3.DLL have already been removed on PA500. User can refer to 0and 5 for detail supporting API.

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