Presentation for the 2012 IS&T Non-Impact Printing Conference

1. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Progressive Barcodes
Marie Vans, Steve Simske, & Brad Loucks
September 12, 2012

2. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.2
Progressive Barcodes?
Outline
- Previous Work
- The Progressive Barcode
- Some experiments
- The End
http://odehne.wordpress.com/category/directsmile
/
http://my.opera.com/vikaskhan/albums/show.dml?id=39237
92
http://www.goodlightscraps.com/funnyanimals.php">Funny Animals

3. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Previously….

4. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.4
At NIP’27
Color Tiles
•1D barcodes don’t hold enough information, so…
•We used 2D barcodes, which include QR (Quick Response) and
Data Matrix barcodes…
•These have a much higher payload (data embedded), but…
•Color adds more bits, more flavor, and more possibilities for aesthetics
and
branding…
•In this paper, we are extending the science of 3D barcoding with:
•Time varying color barcodes with
•Increased Security Payload Density

5. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.5
What is a color tile?
A 2D barcode with 6 payload colors, > 2.5 bits/tile
Non-payload indicia
Non-payload indicia
The example shown here
comprises:
1. 64 data tiles, max 165 bits
total
2. 8 non-payload tiles:
a. Two black for orientation
and corner detection
b. 6 color {RGBCMY} for
color calibration
c. The colors are 180
rotated from their color
opponency pair,
providing the greatest
contrast in hue space
and thus the most
reliable opposite-corner
orientation detection
possible
3. Whitespace in the middle—
for carrying a 2D barcode?

6. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.6
What else can we do with these color tiles?
We can actually use this idea to create a barcode
that looks familiar.
There is basically no limit to the size (in number of
tiles down and across).
We can encode information that changes over time.
Why would we?
1. We need a barcode that can hold much more information
than
its black & white counterpart.
2. We want to track a package or a document as it goes
through
its normal workflow.
3. We wish to use branded colors along with information
carrying tiles.

7. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The Progressive Barcode

8. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Barcodesare a familiardata-carryingmark
Addingprogressiveinformationto a barcodeallowsit to
change through time—supportingmany different information
lifecycles.
Creatinga Progressive Barcode entailsthe following:
Progressive Barcodes – How do they work?
1. Use of non-data elements for calibration, skew and
warp detection and segmentation as with existing 2D
(black and white) and 3D (color) barcodes
2. All data elements start out white
3. Initiate the workflow/lifecycle with the secure addition
of the appropriate colors directly coded from the
secure binary stream
4. Increment colors – not size or barcode format – over
time, and multiple stages are thereby represented
5. Progressive barcodes can be engineered to be
readable as an existing barcode standard with the
additional security of the colors added to the otherwise
“white” modules.

9. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Progressive Barcodes – What is
Progression?

10. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.10
Progressive Barcodes – Color Progression
* This was developed to allow overprinting existing barcodes, but does not
require it.

11. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.11
A. Initial –
10% filled
B. 1st WF Step:
Add 25%
C. 2nd WF
Step: Add 25%
more
D. Last WF
Step: Add
25% more
Progressive Barcodes – Example
Progression

12. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.12
Progressive Barcode- Registry
Initial Incremental Incremental …
Initial Incremental Incremental
How might we implement a workflow using
Progressive Barcodes?
Registry Interfaces

13. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.13
Progressive barcodes allow us to assign the statistical probability
• Associated with any transition between two steps in a workflow
• Based on how many bits are written and how many remain
•Governing equation is:

i
i
RB
IU
P
N
N
!
!
.
Progressive Barcodes - Statistical Probability
Pi = Step i
NRB, = the number of residual (0 bits) at end of the workflow
NIU = number of initial unwritten bits is, then the per-step

14. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
Some Experiments

15. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.15
A. { R:252,
G:255,
B:252}
B. {R:160,
G:255, B:160}
- Readable
{ R:0, G: 255,
B: 0} – Not
Readable
.
Progressive Barcodes – Saturation Readability
Can you make these things too dark?

16. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.16
.
Progressive Barcodes – Percent Saturation Readability
D. 25% full E. 50% full F. 75% full
What about too full?

17. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The End…..Or is it?

18. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.18
Progressive Barcodes – User Interface

19. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.19
Dual-Purpose Progressive Barcodes
Making the progressive barcode work harder.

20. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.20
Wrap-up
Relevant for:
 Workflow submission
 Routing tracking
 Archive and document transformations
 Progressive barcode ties physical document to
its electronic workflow (as both a “job” and a
“document”).
 User signature (digital, electronic, physical marks
on the paper) can be tied into the progressive
barcode.
 Stick around for an even more interesting
presentation on progressive barcodes by Steve
Simske.

21. © Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.
The End…really
Thank you