Simplify your laptop buying
An Android-based smartphone, the G1 from T-Mobile.
(Credit: T-Mobile)After preloading an iPhone app on Sansumg camera phones and expanding to Mexico, Scanbuy announced Tuesday that its ScanLife multi-bar code reader is now compatible for mobile phones running on Google Android.
As in any other mobile device, the ScanLife application allows for scanning a 2D bar code and automatically performing an action or function associated with that code. The action can be displaying a specific Web site, launching a video, dialing a phone number, or anything else a smartphone can do.
This way, bar codes can help eliminate the need to use the phone's tiny keyboard. You can even go to Scanlife's Web site to create your own bar code and associate it with whatever Web page or contact information you want.
The application supports major 2D bar code formats (including Datamatrix, EZcode, and QR) and can be downloaded for free from www.getscanlife.com when you visit the site on the mobile browser.
With the addition of Android, the ScanLife software is now compatible with virtually all popular mobile operating systems including BlackBerry, iPhone, Java, Symbian, and Windows Mobile.
Bar codes have become more popular in the last few years. If you fly now, most airlines allow you to print your own boarding pass that contains several types of bar codes. American Airlines even lets you use your mobile phone that displays a bar code to board their airplanes at selected airports.
Scanbuy, a company that's been making a fuss about its EZCode technology in the United States, on Wednesday demonstrated that it's been busy making a fuss about this in Mexico, too.
The ScanLife app running on a smartphone.
(Credit: ScanBuy)The company announced the launch of a new service called "Codigo Ideas" by Telcel, which allows camera phones to read 2D bar codes.
Codigo Ideas is a smartphone application that can be downloaded from mx.getscanlife.com. The app is very much like the ScanLife for the iPhone, which allows phones to take a picture of an 2D EZCode and then launches a specific action associated with that code, such as opening up a Web site, downloading contact information, and so on.
Basically, the codes create mobile links from physical items and remove the need to type in long URLs or search for content by keywords.
Telcel is a major wireless services provider in Mexico with more than 53 million clients. This is a good news for Scanbuy, and for smartphone users too. I personally tried ScanLife with my iPhone and really liked it. However,the technology is only useful once it has become ubiquitous.
In addition to the U.S. and Mexico, Scanbuy's 2D EZCode technology has so far been introduced to multiple parts of the world, including Brazil, Spain, France, Denmark, and the Philippines.
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Facebook's EZcode.
(Credit: ScanLife)Scanbuy announced on Wednesday their free Scanlife barcode reader for iPhone called ScanLife. The software allows for scanning an EZcode using the iPhone's camera then instantaneously executing an individual action that the code is associated to, such as launching a Web site without you having to remember its URL and typing it on the phone's browser.
ScanLife saves you from having to remember and type in the URL for a web page.
(Credit: ScanLife)I tried ScanLife on my new iPhone 3G to launch a few Web sites, and it worked very well most of the time, even when the code is not on the center of the photo. A few times when the photo was blurry or underexposed, I had to take it again.
The software only works with EZcodes, which you can create your own for free after a quick registration. You can even create an EZcode for a specific Web page, for example, to send users directly to an iTunes page to preview and purchase a specific song or to watch a particular video on YouTube.
ScanLife is available for other smartphones, too. You can get it by texting the word "SCAN" to 43588 to receive the download instructions or go to www.getscanlife.com on your mobile browser. ScanLife supports hundreds of other camera cell phones running major mobile operating systems including BREW, Java, Symbian, Palm, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile.
This seems a fun and convenient way to access and process information from your phones, especially when the implementation of EZCodes becomes popular.
There's a catch, though: your memory will atrophy, and soon enough you won't be able to do anything without your phone. This has already happened to me.
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