Barcode Scanner Connection With Ignition

Ignition
1

Hello everyone,

I’m trying to work with a Zebra LI4278 handheld barcode scanner for an upcoming project.
This scanner can support interfaces blow:

  • USB connection to a host
  • Standard RS-232 connection to a host
  • Keyboard Wedge connection to a host

Now my question is what interface is supported and works better with Ignition? I am pretty new to Ignition and I have not worked with any barcode scanner before so I am not even sure how to get information from barcode scanner with the above interfaces and send it to Ignition. I would appreciate any information you may give.

Thank you!

2

I would recommend just using ‘keyboard wedge’ or HID mode. Serial connections can be done, but are (in my experience) more trouble than they’re worth.

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3

In Vision, I always use Serial Mode. No delimiters or focus issues. Yes, you need a read thread to parse and deliver to client tags or to window components.

HID or wedge for Perspective–not really any choice.

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4

Thank you @PGriffith and @pturmel. What if we send the barcode data to PLC and then send that info to Ignition. Does this make the process easier/faster?

5

I really like sepasoft’s barcode scanner component for Vision. I set the preamble and postamble to 0x02 and 0x03 (start text and end text). For Vision, it works flawlessly for my projects.

2 Likes
6

I do like routing through the gateway and only using clients for state display and for manual entry. It also eliminates some concerns about the physical location of a client.

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7

The thing is I am not exactly sure how to get the data from barcode scanner to ignition in serial mode. Is there any place in Ignition that you assign this? I saw a barcode scanner component there and you can change its interface mode but I am not quite sure if that helps me to achieve what I want or not (which is pulling out the data from barcode scanner and searching through an SQL database for that numbers/data)

8

In serial mode, in Vision, you can use the system.serial.* scripting functions in a background thread to read the port.

1 Like
9

So then I think I can use something like this:
system.serial.readBytesAsString
Correct?

10

You would need to use system.serial.configureSerialPort() and openSerialPort() for setup, then readBytesAsString() when data is recieved. The read is blocking and I don’t think you can just have it sit forever waiting for data. You might need to create some sort of listener to watch for serial data?

2 Likes
12

Thank you very much for your response!

13

Yeas, you can wait forever. A thread interrupt from outside can be used to cleanly shutdown.

1 Like