Code 93 barcode is a type of linear barcode used to encode high density variable length data. Code 39 is capable of encoding alphanumeric data along with special characters and is a variable length code. Code 39 can encode all the 26 uppercase alphabets, numeric digits from 0-9 and seven special characters including – (minus), (dot), $(dollar), / (forward slash), + (plus), %( percentage) and SPACE.
Code 93 barcode has been named code 93 due to the fact that it has been divided into a total of 9 modules and it must contain 3 bars and 3 spaces in between. In addition to the aforementioned characters, code 93 can also encode 5 more special characters which enables It to code all the ASCII characters efficiently.
History
In 1982, Intermec started work on improving the already existing code 39 barcode standards in terms of security and data density. Therefore, the company came up with a denser and more robust barcode standard which could encode 5 extra characters as compared to traditional code 39 standard. This new barcode standard was named as code 9 of 3 barcode or in compressed form, code 93.
Purpose
Code 39 barcode has certain drawbacks particularly in data storage capacity and barcode security, code 39 performed poorly. Keeping in view these problems, work started on code 93 barcode whose purpose was to develop such a barcode standard which has high data density and high security.
Advantages
· Extremely high density barcode. Although it is a type of linear barcodes who do not store large amount of data and have low density, code 93 is high density and is able to store large data in linear patters.
· High security barcode. It has enhanced security features of code 39 which was considered less secure.
· Easy to learn and less employee training is required to encode and decode this barcode standard.
Limitations
· Can store large amounts of data but it is still less dense as compared to the 2-D barcodes.
· Less fault tolerance to damage and distortion. If a certain portion of the barcode is damaged or distorted it is very difficult to recover the data. This is general problem with all linear barcodes.
Usage
· Canada post uses code93 in order to encode customer and product delivery information.