Thread: ScanLife Barcode Reader Updated to read all barcodes

Well I just found another great little app. They just updated this yesterday. Now ScanLife has always been able to read 2D barcodes, but now if you have a phone with an auto focus camera you can read UPC/EAN. You will now be able to scan UPC labels from lots of major products, like DVD's, Books, Food products, T.V.'s, ETC. The really nice part is, the app will auto search google so you can price compare. Now this is where I get a bit skeptical. I have now scanned about 15 different items from phone batteries to toilet paper, every google search returns no results because it try's to find the barcode number. It does a great job of reading and recognizing the barcodes, just finds nothing. This will be a wonderful app when they make barcode listings publicly available. So I want to hear your thoughts on this app, let me know what you think!

• Download OTA from Scanlife

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i can hardly get the thing to scan datamatrix and QR codes... and i havent been able to get it to capture any upc/ean codes. is there something i could be doing wrong??

ok i think i was just taking bad pictures...takes a little getting used to...
but i did do a box of paper clips to try it out... and it went to google and found prices as well! awesome little app... ha its kinda entertaining

p.s. - make sure your lighting is relatively even or it thinks the shadows are part of the code.

Not to intentionally bring in a rival product into this discussion but Edocrab does everything that this app seems to be trying to do with no hitches whatsoever. Edocrab will scan any barcode (even if you clumsily hold your device at an angle and make no attempt to help it read properly) and in a matter of seconds it's looking up product references online. As the OP said, I have tried Edocrab (Barcode backwards) on everything from instant soup to tissues to the box of my BlackBerry and it never fails.

so does edocrab also read the 2d barcodes???

No edocrab does not read 2D barcodes. And to be honest I have only gotten edocrab to read 2 barcodes for me. Toilet paper and a book. Everything else times out or will not read. I still have edocrab on my phone but it has become pointless to me because its unusable.
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well i went home from work yesterday and entertained myself by scanning barcodes from the two apps (edocrab and scanlife). both have their ups and downs. as far as the "normal" barcodes go, i personally had trouble getting either app to read unless the picture was juuuuuuuust right. but i mean im sure getting any app to read a barcode from a picture (much less one made from a phone) is pretty difficult.

ha but i did find it entertaining scanning random barcodes to see what would happen...

but i personally prefer to sms google the upc code or the product name. same idea, less time picture taking. (or if im around a computer, i just use google shopping)

Ya'll may wanna try this....I changed the auto focus on my 9550 to close up and its found every barcode on the first try. Google doesn't find everything I shoot but ScanLife has accepted the first picture each time.

i was wondering...do you have to have os 5 to change the auto focus for close up pics?

Not sure. You can try by opening the camera, press BB button and goto options. It should say auto focus and change it to closeup.
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the way this app always pops up when I take a pic is annoying...
of course we can turn this app off alltogether...
would like it better if the app access the camera when I needed it, then turn off by default...

Originally Posted by Munyuk81

the way this app always pops up when I take a pic is annoying...
of course we can turn this app off alltogether...
would like it better if the app access the camera when I needed it, then turn off by default...

Thanks for digging this up!!!

I had a customer just today looking into upgrade his AT&T plan and looking at various smartphones. But he wanted one with a good barcode reader. I am going to give him this info tomorrow. Thanks...

I too have used edocrab with great success, will ty this one one and compare.

I will try this update thanks