"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message 
news:4aeaee56$1@news.povray.org...
> It's not as trivial as it sounds. ;-)

Sorry, didn't meant to imply it wasn't hard, just that other people have 
done it a few times. :)

I'm currently working (in my spare time) on trying to write a fluid dynamics 
solver, which also isn't novel, but it's new to me. I got into it thinking, 
"How hard can it be?"

Hoo, boy.

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Captain Jack wrote:

> I'm currently working (in my spare time) on trying to write a fluid dynamics 
> solver, which also isn't novel, but it's new to me. I got into it thinking, 
> "How hard can it be?"
> 
> Hoo, boy.

Hahahahaha.

0WN3D!



Here, have a cookie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58_s6r7PaKo

This is what happens when you play with a simple non-linear dynamical 
system. (It represents about a day's worth of computer time, BTW.)

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> I'd suspect that, e.g., an inkjet printer probably won't print small 
> barcodes with sufficient accuracy.)

You can buy parcel shipping online here in Germany, and you get a label to 
print out with the barcode on.  This is then scanned by the machine at the 
unmanned drop-off point.  Once my inkjet had a blocked nozzle and I was 
there for 10 minutes trying to get the damn thing to scan.  Then I realised 
what the problem was, got a black pen and filled in the bar that had a bit 
missing by hand - it worked!

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scott wrote:

> You can buy parcel shipping online here in Germany, and you get a label 
> to print out with the barcode on.  This is then scanned by the machine 
> at the unmanned drop-off point.  Once my inkjet had a blocked nozzle and 
> I was there for 10 minutes trying to get the damn thing to scan.  Then I 
> realised what the problem was, got a black pen and filled in the bar 
> that had a bit missing by hand - it worked!

That's pretty epic, really... :-D

Actually, I notice the Royal Mail let you buy "stamps" online now, where 
the stamp is actually a PDF file which prints out a 2D barcode...

Oh, and I finally found out what all those zig-zags are for:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RM4SCC

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"Invisible" <voi### [at] devnull> wrote in message 
news:4aeaf3f8$1@news.povray.org...
> Captain Jack wrote:
>
>> I'm currently working (in my spare time) on trying to write a fluid 
>> dynamics solver, which also isn't novel, but it's new to me. I got into 
>> it thinking, "How hard can it be?"
>>
>> Hoo, boy.
>
> Hahahahaha.
>
> 0WN3D!
>
>
>
> Here, have a cookie:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58_s6r7PaKo
>
> This is what happens when you play with a simple non-linear dynamical 
> system. (It represents about a day's worth of computer time, BTW.)

I look forward to seeing it with great anticipation. However, it's about 
10:15 AM on a Friday where I'm at now, which puts me at the office, which 
has blocked YouTube and almost everything else that's interesting.

Fortunately, the blocking software service that we use appears to think that 
the Internet and the Web are the same thing, so I can come here to cool off 
my brain cells. Puts me in mind of a friend of mine, who once said to me, 
"Usenet? Is that new? What's their web site look like?"

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Invisible schrieb:

> 8. If you're using a 2D *camera* instead of a real laser barcode 
> scanner, multiply all of the above issues by 7.

Not really. Just pick a random straight line through the picture, and 
pretend that's your laser beam.

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>> 8. If you're using a 2D *camera* instead of a real laser barcode 
>> scanner, multiply all of the above issues by 7.
> 
> Not really. Just pick a random straight line through the picture, and 
> pretend that's your laser beam.

Except that a human wouldn't aim the laser beam at random, see? Also, as 
I understand it, lasers don't go out of focus...

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Invisible schrieb:

> Oh, and I finally found out what all those zig-zags are for:
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RM4SCC

Yeah. Back to Ogham. Somehow.

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> Except that a human wouldn't aim the laser beam at random, see?

Humans don't aim the beam, usually it's wiggled about all over the place 
automatically very quickly, in the hope of picking up a valid barcode scan 
at some point.  You could do the same on a 2D image (just pick points at 
random on the edges and scan between them).

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scott wrote:
>> Except that a human wouldn't aim the laser beam at random, see?
> 
> Humans don't aim the beam, usually it's wiggled about all over the place 
> automatically very quickly, in the hope of picking up a valid barcode 
> scan at some point.  You could do the same on a 2D image (just pick 
> points at random on the edges and scan between them).

Actually you could do better. You could search around for a rectangular 
area of white with black stuff inside it, try to figure out the 
orientation of its edges, and then skim a line across the line edge. 
It's kinda tricky though...

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