Barcode Tutorials and FAQ for Microsoft Access, Word and Excel


Providing barcode tutorials, plug-ins, FAQs, integration and printing solutions for Microsoft Access, Excel, Word, FrontPage and other Office applications.

Creating barcodes in Microsoft® Excel® is an easy task with IDAutomation products. IDAutomation offers easy-to-use barcode plug-ins, macros and barcode fonts as well as ActiveX Controls that are MS Office plug-ins that are simple to use. To use barcode fonts, either the start and stop character must be added with a formula or use the MS Office Macros. Barcode fonts work best when creating barcodes in an entire column in a spreadsheet.

Microsoft Excel Tutorial Index:

Using the Barcode Plug-in:

After purchasing or downloading the plug-in (called the ActiveX Control), it can be dragged, dropped and resized in the spreadsheet. In Microsoft Excel, choose View - Toolbars - Control Toolbox, a tool box will appear.

In the tool box dialog, choose the more controls button:

Then, select the barcode control from the list of available ActiveX Controls. Select the control installed starting with "IDAutomation", then drop it on a spreadsheet. After selecting it, the control will appear in the spreadsheet like a graphic image, resize the plug-in 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 link a cell to the data to be encoded in the barcode, enter the cell in the "LinkedCell" property of the control.

When finished, exit the design mode by choosing the design mode button:

To edit the properties of the control the design mode must be enabled. If there are problems editing the properties of the control, press the design mode button to enable it.

Using Barcode Fonts in MS Excel:

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 unnecessary to calculate check characters. IDAutomation's EZ Barcode Font Package contains easy to use versions of Code 39 and Codabar in the same package.

Check characters are used in more dense symbologies so the barcode scanner can verify the barcode was read correctly. However, to help technical users integrate barcodes into an applications, IDAutomation does provide font automation tools such as the MS Office Macros to automatically format the start, stop and check characters to the barcode fonts. For information on these tools, please review the font automation tools site or review the Excel tutorial on implementing the macros.

All barcodes require a start and stop character. IDAutomation's Code 39 fonts can be easily printed or displayed as calculated fields in Excel by (1) using a formula to append the asterisks to the beginning and ending of the field and (2) selecting the font for the field. The example below creates the text for a Code 39 barcode in cell B2 from the data in cell A2.

Append the required asterisks for Code 3 of 9 to data from cell A1...

Combining multiple fields into a single barcode

Tabs and returns can be added with Code 39 fonts (in extended39 mode) between fields by inserting "$I" for a tab and "$M" for a return. For example, this formula encodes a tab between cells C3 and D3: =("!"&C3&"$I"&D3&"!")

Using Code 39 in the Excel example below enter the formula in cell E3.

In this Microsoft Excel example, we selected the Code39 font and entered the formula in cell E3

Creating barcodes in an entire column in a spreadsheet

If a large column of data needs to be bar-coded, where copying and pasting the barcode font formula into each cell would be cumbersome, then creating barcodes in an entire column would be essential. In this example, Code 3 of 9 barcodes are created in the Excel using the Code 39 font that is included in the EZ Barcode Font Package. To use fonts other than the self-checking versions such as Code 128 or Interleaved 2 of 5, please refer to the tutorials on the MS Office Macros site.

The barcodes in column B will be created from the data in column A. This assumes the EZ Barcode Font Package is installed. First, enter the formula in one cell. The formula ="*"&A2&"*" is entered in cell B2 to append the required asterisks to data from cell A1:
Next, select that cell and choose Edit - Copy. After that, highlight the entire column by selecting the gray square labeled "B" at the top of the spreadsheet and choose Edit - Paste. The formulas may take a little time to re-calculate.
Next, change the data in the column to be the Code 39 barcode font. With the entire column that contains the formula highlighted, choose the IDAutomationEZHC39S font from the EZ Barcode Font Package or another appropriate font. The barcodes will appear in the entire column.
With the entire column that contains the formula still highlighted, choose the appropriate point size. Here 12 points was chosen so it will be compatible with all barcode scanners. If smaller barcodes are to be scanned, IDAutomation's SC5USB Plug 'n Play Scanner can read this font printed as small as 6 points. With the entire column that contains the formula still highlighted, choose the center text option so the barcode is in the center of the field. Then, make the column wide enough so there is some white space between the beginning and ending of the barcode.

To use fonts other than the self-checking versions, please refer to IDAutomation's MS Office Macros site.

To determine the start and stop characters for particular types of barcode fonts or to see a list of all fonts offered, view IDAutomation's product index.

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