Barcodes and 2D codes

The codes a till, a warehouse scanner, a boarding gate or a phone reads, printed straight onto the document.

A code is a number written so that a machine can read it without anybody typing it. The stripes of a shop code, the squares of the code a phone camera reads, and the denser codes a warehouse or an airline uses are all produced here, on the page, at the size and the position you choose.

Every one of them is checked after it is drawn. The team runs a scanner over the finished page and compares what comes back with what was asked for, and that is done before a sample is published rather than after a customer complains.

What it saves you

No typing, and so no typing mistakes
A code read at a till or a loading bay is taken in one movement, and it cannot be confused with a number that merely looks similar.
A customer pays by pointing a phone at the page
A QR code on an invoice can carry a bank transfer whole. The banking application fills in the amount and the account, so nothing is copied by hand and nothing is copied wrongly.
The right code for the job
Shop stripes for a shelf edge, a QR code for a phone, a dense code for a boarding pass or a part too small to carry anything larger.

See it done

Code 128 and retail barcodes

Stripes for the two jobs that want them: Code 128 for any text at all, and the three a till reads — EAN-13, UPC-A, EAN-8 — each with its last digit worked out rather than typed.

QR codes

The code an invoice, a boarding pass or a label ends up wanting, drawn into the document rather than fetched as a picture and pasted in.

Data Matrix codes

The code industry marks small parts with: still readable at sizes where a QR code has given up, on a circuit board or a phial in a laboratory tray.

PDF417 codes

The code on identity documents and shipping papers: it carries far more text than a row of bars, and it survives a laser scanner dragged across it.

Aztec codes

The code on rail and airline tickets, and the reason is room: it needs no band of white around it, which is the first thing trimmed off a layout that has run tight.