Barcode Scanner, Inventory Lessons on the Way!

UPDATE! First Lesson Posted: Barcode Scanning

You guys have been asking for it for a few YEARS now. It's finally on the short list. I started working on the preliminary planning for Barcoding with Access lessons yesterday.

I downloaded an old (free) barcode font that I used to use for my old business way back in the 90s. It still works like a champ. Super easy to install and use. Thanks to Alex for helping me find it. I dusted off my old USB barcode wand scanner. Still works like a champ too. I'll be recommending a few different scanners for you guys if you want to buy one for your needs. They're cheap. Like this one for only $16. Crazy how inexpensive this stuff has become.

I've already covered some inventory basics in Access Developer 23. I'm going to be expanding on that in the continuing Developer classes, and then once those are finished, I'll be putting them all together in a separate Barcoding Seminar. So you will have your choice, either get the Developer lessons or the Seminar (about the same price). 

I'm also going to put together a free TechHelp video on the very basics of barcoding, such as how to download and install the font, set up your scanner, and print some basic barcode labels like the ones in the picture above. The Extended Cut will go into a little bit more. Then I'll cover the meat and potatoes in the Developer classes / Seminar.

I definitely plan to cover the following topics:

• Printing barcode labels for your products (by Product ID)
• Printing a whole sheet of labels (you just added 30 keyboards to your inventory)
• Scanning products into inventory, scanning them out into orders
• Printing serial number labels for UNITS (a unit is a specific individual item, for example you might have a ProductID representing a keyboard, but each of those 30 keyboards is a separate unit. If you want to know which one specifically that customer received, so you'll track units instead of products).

Some other possible topics I might cover, based on your feedback

• Scanning in books (ISBN) or commercial products with UPC codes, looking those up in a web-based database and returning product details to your database.

So give me your feedback and let me know what other topics you want to see covered. I've got a couple of other projects I need to work on over the next week or so, but I'd like to start this by the end of January. Still in the planning stages right now, but I want to get your feedback before I start recording.

Thanks.