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Topic: BARCODES GET SMART
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knowHim
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BARCODES GET SMART
BBC News reports: "The goods on supermarket shelves are about to get a lot smarter. The University of Cambridge, UK, has just opened a centre dedicated to researching smart labeling systems that can hold much more information than the simple barcode. The centre is working on AutoID systems, using tags fitted with radio links that can transmit data. Barcodes have proved enormously useful to almost every business since they were 1st invented more than 25 years ago. However the big problem with barcodes is that they have to be scanned with a reader to find out the information they contain. By contrast smart tags, that can be picked up by radio, can be read from a distance which greatly speeds up the process of checking for almost anything.
Imagine if all boxes, cases and pallets, products were fitted with radio tags, even a whole truck could be checked in just a few moments as each box would report its contents automatically. The technology magazine, Computing, speculates that the radio tags could remove the need to have check-out desks at supermarkets, could see the arrival of ice-cream that tells your fridge the temperature is too high or jars that warn you when they are out of date. The AutoID centre at Cambridge, and its partner institution at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is refining the tag system and the language it would use to swap information with reading devices or household appliances…
The centre is working on ways to make the Auto ID technology cheap enough for mass use. But the researchers believe that once the smart tags are widely used, that will rapidly bring the price down…"
From: BBC News
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Plow on, plow on...
David Campbell
Posts: 426 | From: Charlestown, IN | Registered: Jun 2002
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