Barcode Printing From a Blackberry? Zebra's Got You Covered

Published: December 15, 2009

by Alex Woodie

We are all impressed that you can play Sudoko on your iPhone, or find the nearest Starbuck's in a matter of seconds. But can your precious iPhone help you crank out a barcode for specimen tracking, or generate a receipt in the field? No, and that's why the new Smart Phone utility unveiled last week by Zebra Technologies is sure to be the killer app for all the field personnel on your Christmas list this year.

As the result of the new Smart Phone utility for its software development kit, Zebra is enabling Blackberry users to control barcode printing jobs from the comfort of their phones. Zebra sees its new Smart Phone utility being used by field personnel who would otherwise need to lug around a dedicated terminal to generate barcodes for things such as field service records, tracking tags, point-of-sale receipts, and, yes, generating specimen labels.

"This will have a significant impact on mobile workers in applications such as field sales, field service, route accounting, and others as workers will be able to function with smart phones from virtually anywhere," applications technologies director Victor Salmons stated in a press release.

The Smart Phone utility works with 15 Zebra printers, including several mobile thermal barcode printers like the QL, RW, and MZ series; desktop printers like the HC100 Patient ID Solution and G-Series; midrange printers like the ZM-series; and high-end printers like the iIII Plus and Xi4 . The utility is available as a free download from Zebra's Web site: www.zebra.com.

(And yes, IT Jungle is aware of the new iBarcode application for the iPhone that was announced last week by the German developer www.apnoti.com. However, instead of actually generating barcode applications, it merely reads them, and then shows the user how much that product is being advertised for on the Internet, so they can go buy it there if they want to. That is really great for consumers--and iPhone users are great consumers--but it doesn't do much for people who actually work with barcodes.)

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