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Creating barcodes in Microsoft® Access™ can be a relatively easy
task with IDAutomation products. IDAutomation has easy-to-use barcode
plug-ins, macros and barcode fonts. The information provided here was
created with the assumption that the user has a basic understanding
of barcoding, otherwise please review IDAutomation’s
Barcoding
for Beginners.
When implementing barcodes in an Access database, the ActiveX Controls
are an easy-to-use Microsoft plug-in. However, if using barcode fonts
instead, these require adding the start and stop character and calculating
the check character if needed manually or using IDAutomation
Office VBA Macros.
If there is a need to create barcode labels out of an Access database,
the Barcode Label
Software application can link to Microsoft Access columns as a data
source for a text or barcode object, which allows printing of labels
from data in Access.
Using the Barcode Plug-in:
 After
purchasing
or downloading
the plug-in (which is called the ActiveX Control), it can be dragged,
dropped and resized it on a form such as a report. In Design Mode of
a Microsoft Access report, choose Insert - ActiveX control. Select
the installed control starting with "IDAutomation", drop it on the form
and resize the control as necessary. To change the properties of the
control, such as barcode height and symbology type, right click on the
control and choose
properties.
To bind the control to a data source, enter the table and field or formula
in the control source field as in the example above; do not just
enter the field. The proper barcode will show up after the report
is saved and run. The barcode will be created from the data in the control
source field.
Using Barcode Fonts in Access:
Implementing barcode solutions with
IDAutomation fonts provides a high level of scalability with operating
systems, applications and printer independence.
It should be noted that if the client is not a technical user or
programmer, use the self-checking barcode fonts. Self-checking
fonts (such as
Code 39
and Codabar)
have the checking code built-in so that it is not necessary to calculate
check characters.
Self-checking fonts are easy to use in Access as well as other applications
and can be entered directly from the keyboard. All barcodes require
start and stop characters and must be included in the barcode. Without
the start and stop character in the barcode, the scanner does not know
where the barcode starts or ends.
For example, to create a barcode that encodes the data "1234ABCD"
with the Code 39 Font:
- Select the font from the list of fonts in the application.
- Type the start character, in this case it is "!" .
- Type the data, in this case it is "1234ABCD" .
- Type the stop character, in this case it is "!"; the data string
at this point should be !1234ABCD!. Then change the font back to
the default font of the document so other text typed in will be
human readable.
Automating the printing of self-checking fonts for an Access report
is easy, just make sure the start and stop characters appear directly
before and after the data in the barcode. For example, to print the
Code 39 Fonts from a MS Access report, use =("!" & [Table.Field]
& "!") in the control source field where Table.Field points
to the table and field that contains the data to encode. The following
Microsoft® Access formula places a tab function (in
extended39)
between fields:
=("!"&[DataField1] & "$I" & [DataField2]
& "!")
Below is an example of placing the above formula in a text field
on a report in Microsoft® Access 2000. When placing formulas in the
control source field, be sure to specify the table and field together
as in this example.
Barcode symbologies such as Code 128
or UPC/EAN,
require special formatting so that the data, when the barcode font is applied,
will be scannable. To use fonts other than the self-checking versions, please refer
to IDAutomation's
MS Office
Macros site. Over 30
royalty free font tools, macros and plug-ins are provided
to complete this automatically.
To see a list of all fonts offered, view IDAutomation's
product index.
Use Native Barcode Generator for Access:
 The
Native Barcode
Generator for Microsoft Access provides dynamic barcoding capability
to Microsoft Access Reports without the installation of additional fonts
or other components. Once installed, the product remains embedded in
the database, even when distributed. Complete VBA source code is provided
with purchase. Supported symbologies include Code 3 of 9, Code 128,
MSI, UCC/EAN-128, Interleaved 2 of 5, PostNet, OneCode and PDF417.
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