Re: mbarcode
 

getting russian letters as wierd symbols. does it support non utf-8 or non english letters at all?

Re: mbarcode
 

I remember I did some enhancements to support UTF-8, but I don't think we have done it all through the application. It might as well be a problem with the backend (zbar and libdmtx) that doesn't handle those characters correctly.

What kind of code where you scanning when you experienced this?

Re: mbarcode
 

Are these chars unicode?

The backends should support unicode, but the intermediate code (i.e. mine) doesn't currently.

OTOH if we're still talking about 8bit data, it may be that we need to determine the character set and tell Qt which one to use to display the data correctly.

As an aside, I've just spoken with the developer of libdmtx and he would like to improve performance of libdmtx and asked for some dmtx codes from the N900 camera to help with that :)

Re: mbarcode
 

I just tested with some norwegian characters in a QR-code myself and it failed by assuming it was the latin1-charset. I've made some changes and pushed these to the svn-repo now. Haven't got the time to test it yet, but they should add UTF8 support without braking anything.

I think most QR-codes are UTF8, but I might be wrong, so your idea about detecting charset is we get any new reports on errors after assuming everything is UTF8.

About libdmtx, that is really great news! While you're at it, send the developer some great thank-yous for making that library open source! :D

Re: mbarcode
 

Nice one :)

Will do, we need to implement that feature we were discussing, whereby users can save an image they were trying to scan, I should have some time this weekend so will have a look at it.

Re: mbarcode
 

I've had a good play with this alongside my friends motorola milestone using zxing and I feel that zxing is a better program for a number of reasons.

I find the UI in zxing to be far more intuitive and generally nicer. I like the way that you don't have to click scan to capture a code, I like the way it does this automatically.

Is there any way to improve the camera autofocus drive algorithm in mbarcode, again compared with the performance of zxing on the milestone, mbarcode is somewhat lacking in my experience.

How about a force led's on/off button?

How about making the camera display fullscreen with overlayed info? I have seen this done with the theodolite app for the iPhone, and it makes for a far more pleasurable user experience in my opinion...

zxing is much faster an recognising barcodes, and gives you feedback whilst it's attempting to do so. Might be an idea?

Please don't take these suggestions as a complaint, I don't intend it to be anything like that, it's just my observations of what the 'competition' are offering.

I don't know how big the dev team behind both of these apps are so It could be that zxing just have much more programming resources on they're hands, so again if this is the case and I'm just not well informed then I apologise!

Hugh, who's boss saw my n900 and promptly got a milestone...

Re: mbarcode
 

I'm afraid we still have some way to go to meet the qualities of other similar applications, but any input on how we could do better and what we can learn is always appreciated :)
What other things do you think makes zxing more intuitive and prettier? I haven't tried zxing myself, so I don't know what it looks/feels like ;) When you say you don't have to click scan first, does that mean the application starts with the scanner running?
There probably is, and we'll hopefully get time to look into it, but for now there are other things higher up on our priority list :)
That is a great idea! I'll have to see how the led flashlight application works and see if we could do something similiar. I've experienced one time too many that there is not enough light to scan.
We've discussed having a (almost) fullscreen camera when scanning, and you can actually enable this in the settings menu for the moment. Using overlays is no bad idea, and I agree that it might make the look of the application better. However, I'm not sure if the functionality is really improved when all you're actually supposed to do is scan a barcode. Do we need a full screen for that? :p
Feedback is a good idea. Making the speed better is an issue we are adressing upstream to the zbar and libdmtx developers, but I guess this is a bit further ahead in time for now.
No worries! :) Always a good thing to get some input on how things are working and what improvements could be made.
Nothing to apologise ;) but you are right about the number of developers. mbarcode currently has two active developers (me and lardman) who are working on it on our spare time. ZXing is backed by Google and appearantly has at least 17 people involved in the project:
http://code.google.com/p/zxing/people/list
So we're naturally not going to be able to work on this as fast as them, but it doesn't mean we can't try to compare! :D
I hope he didn't consider the Milestone only because of the barcode app? :p

Thanks for the input!

Re: mbarcode
 

Maybe quoting every second line wasn't such a good idea after all. It did brake the design. Well, whatever - now you at least know what I was directing each comment to :)

Re: mbarcode
 

Don't worry dragly, I'll join you with the multiple-quote-make-it-hard-to-read format ;)


Depends what the app does with the data I suppose and whether it's just designed to be used to scan barcodes (rather than to allow access to the data afterwards). I've not used zxing on a phone so I don't know.

No, the autofocus is realistically out of our hands for the time being (binary blob iirc). I was hoping that I'd improved this by only using the inner part of the fov thereby allowing the user to hold the N900 further away from the target (which seemed to me to make the autofocus work better).

Suggestions/comments on experiences welcome though.


That's an option. Do you want this for the autofocus or to scan in the dark?

Again this is reasonably easy to do, but we don't want to focus on the scanning and rather on the use of the data (so didn't go this way to begin with).

Yes, this is a good point. I presume you're talking about 1D codes? This is a problem which I hope will improve (using ZXing is not an option as it's Java, but improving the performance of the zbar and libdmtx codes certainly is). I agree, would be good to have an overlay showing where the code is looking at that moment (I think ZXing shows some green markers...?)

Always good to see constructive criticism and comments, thanks :)

Presumably not just because of the barcode scanning ;)

Re: mbarcode
 

Thanks for the feedback guys...

Regarding zxing, yes it automatically starts in scanning mode and has a highlighted square in the centre of the screen where you are instructed to place the barcode. The display from the camera runs at a high framerate and is silky smooth, the autofocus is working constantly.

Once the code is scanned a popup appears showing information re. the code and by changing the settings you can adjust which online resources are searched for products etc.

How about once mbarcode is started it automatically sends a kill -9 to the camera app so you don't have to task switch and kill the camera by hand.

Regarding the led's on/off, it would be nice to be able to turn these on when I decide that it's too dark. Can't Nokia's camera api do this? If there is one, not sure...? Would the led's improve the autofocus at all?

I think the fullscreen fluid camera display would be one of those features that would make this device feel like it's capable of playing with the iPhone and Android devices. For the tech savy linux knowing n900 user, it probably wouldn't matter, but for making the maemo device appear as good as the competition in the eyes of the man on the street, this type of high performance graphical eye candy is a must.

Of course things like that should be nokias responsibiltiy, after all they're the ones to benefit from more user uptake of this device!

The scanning performance of zxing seemed to be better with both 1d and qr codes, but most of the mbarcode lack of performance was due to poor images from the camera and poor to non existant autofocus.

My boss has been a moto man for many years and went for the milestone because it was half as thick as the n900 and is aluminium cased.