At this weekend’s MobileCampNYC2, during Dave Harpers 2D barcode track, we got a sneak-peek preview on Google’s efforts to create a 2D barcode reader software as part of the upcoming Android operating system. It is called ‘Zebra Crossing’ - or ZXing in short, will read QR Codes, Datamatrix and UPC, and is currently in development. Here a few highlights we found (thank you, Will for the original write-up and photos)

* ZXing is an open source project, and will also be available as a standalone J2ME application for use on existing phones.
* This is an early version of the reader, so don’t expect it to completely blow away some of the proprietary readers out here. As he put it, the goal is to set the minimum standard for open source bar code readers.
* As it is an open source project, they’re actively looking for programmers to contribute

What struck me as the most important point that was made, is that ZXing will provide a no-thrills, basic set of behaviour (scan code, open URL) with no strings (and behind the scenes magic such as routing requests through a proxy etc) attached. During Q&A, the possibility was explored to simply include a Barcode-mode for the camera application. The advantage of this would be that it eliminates a stand-alone reader application and just have a background process looking and reacting to barcode patterns. From an end-user perspective, this could be very feasible, since it would be understood as an addtional capability of the camera itself. Upon discussion, it seemed that including the decoding library into the ‘normal’ camera-mode is simple enough.

Here a couple of pictures from Sean’s presentation (which was probably the most crowded one at the event):

Photo by Will Turnage

Photo by Will Turnage

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