Upc-A - Printronix P5000 Series Reference Manual

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UPC-A

UPC-A has two dark bars and two light bars for a total of four bars. Each light/
dark bar is 1 - 4 modules wide. A module is the smallest increment that can
represent data. Zeros are represented by light modules and ones by dark
modules. Each character contains some combination of seven modules that
total two dark bars and two light bars.
The above is always true except with the START/STOP and CENTER
character codes. The START/STOP character bar pattern consists of two
dark bars and one light bar for a total of three bars. The CENTER character
bar pattern has two dark bars and three light bars for a total of five bars.
Parameters P2 through P5 and P7 are not applicable and are ignored.
UCP-A has the following characteristics:
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Illegal characters are not processed and are ignored.
No CENTER code
Intercharacter gap not definable
A variable length of characters per complete symbol. If an odd number of
input digits is sent, the printer inserts a leading 0 to the data stream. This
encodes in the bar code symbol and prints in the human-readable line.
If a checksum is required for bar code readability, you must include it as
part of the data.
Ten digit character set (0 - 9)
START and STOP codes
CENTER code
Intercharacter gap not definable
Fixed length of eleven characters per complete symbol. The first digit is
the number system code, usually followed by a five digit vendor number.
The next five digits are typically the product number. The printer
automatically computes the check digit and embeds it at the end of the
bar code. All twelve digits are encoded in the bar code symbol, with six
digits to the left of the CENTER code in odd parity and six to the right of
the CENTER code with even parity.
If more or less than eleven characters are used or if any of the characters
used are illegal, an error message is printed.
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