Barcodes are small symbolic patterns that relay information about the identity of a product. For the most part, we now take this technology for granted, but barcode technology has become critical in the business world.

The first used of early barcode technology was for keeping track of railroad cars. But barcodes didn’t become part of our everyday life until they were adopted by supermarkets.|But the barcode’s true commercial niche was in automating supermarket checkout systems.}

Now, barcode scanning is implemented by the US Post Office, The Department of Defense, and just about every industrial application you can think of. In 1948 Bernard Silver began research into a system that could automatically read product information. Together with Joseph Woodland, the first workable system was developed using ultraviolet ink. While working at IBM Woodland developed a system based on extending Morse Code in a graphical manner.

The original dots and dashes of Morse Code were printed graphically on a piece of paper as narrow or wide vertical lines. The lines were read by shining a high intensity light through the paper onto an RCA935 photomultiplier tube. By 1949, pioneers Woodland and Silver applied for US Patent 2,612,994 called Classifying Apparatus and Method.

At first, barcode scanning was unreliable and expensive as it required investments from large corporations willing to test the technology’s potential. It wasn’t until 1961 that The Boston and Maine Railroads tested the system on gravel cars. Right around the same time the idea was being discussed by the large grocery chains in the U.S.

Finally the Kroger chain of stores agreed to test a barcode system developed by RCA. In 1969 another company, Computer Identics installed test systems in a Michigan GM plant and a New Jersey warehousing company. These initial tests clearly showed that barcode technology had broad application to a wide range of industries and commercial applications. But the most common use for this technology is in the grocery and retail industry. It helps businesses to improve trade efficiency and as a result, the economy as a whole.

In the mid 1970s the NAFC developed a standardized version of the barcode called the Universal Product Code (UPC). This was an 11 digit code to identify any product, and since then, industry has not been the same. Barcodes really came into their with the development of the standard 11 digit UPC. The acceptance of barcode technology was assured with these developments, and since the early 1980s it has become virtually universally used throughout business and government.

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