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      <page pageid="3571" ns="0" title="Read Bar Code">
        <revisions>
          <rev contentformat="text/x-wiki" contentmodel="wikitext" xml:space="preserve">The Read Bar Code Node scans a given PDF or TIFF document for barcode images and attempts to retrieve the values encoded in them. 

== Basic Options ==

Here is what the first tab on the dialog box looks like when dragged into your Task:

[[file:read_barcode_dialog_1.png]]

=== Barcode Format ===

Select from one of three options:

* Automatically Detect
* Fixed Format
* Dynamic Format

'''Automatically Detect:''' If &quot;Automatically Detect&quot; is enabled, the scanner will attempt all known barcode formats until it finds one which can be used to read any barcode found in the source document. This option may be slower than other options.
'''Fixed Format:''' This option allows you to specify what format is expected by selecting from a drop-down list, which will be faster than attempting all supported formats.
'''Dynamic Format:''' Allows you to enter the expected format into a text field, which can also contain dynamic values to be parsed at runtime, e.g. variables, data table values or function calls. If the value is taken from a column name then a separate scan will be performed for each unique value.

=== Generated Column Names ===

Three new columns will be created or appended to the existing datatable. The first contains the textual value of any barcode found in the document, the second the format of the barcode that was found, and the third is the page number on which the barcode was found (for multipage documents). If no barcode is found these values will contain NULL. The textfields allow you to customise the column name that these values should appear under. If you don't want to change them, just use the default values.

=== Source File ===

This is the file location of the document to be scanned. If it contains a column reference (eg :var{FILELOCATION} ) then the operation will be repeated for each unique value. This allows you to pass in a list of files instead of just one file.

If you only wish to scan the first page of the document, check the &quot;First Page Only&quot; option.

The following file types are supported:

*PDF
*TIFF
*PNG
*JPEG
*GIF

== Advanced Options ==

This tab allows you to control how the document is scanned, and which parts of the document will be scanned to look for barcodes.

[[File:read_barcode_dialog_2.png]]

=== Detect multiple bar codes per page ===

If this is selected, Presence will continue to look for more barcodes after detecting the first one on the page. Each new value found with a new format will be stored in a new row in the [[Data Table]]. Duplicate values will be discarded provided the barcode is the same format.

=== Sections ===

The barcode scan can work better when it is looking at a smaller section of the image, rather than the entire image. To accomplish this you can tell Presence to split the image up into a number of horizontal and vertical sections. At run time the image will be dissected into overlapping sections and each section will be scanned. Use the &quot;horizontal sections&quot; and &quot;vertical sections&quot; spinners to set the number of sections to use. 

=== Preview Pane ===

This shows a preview of how the image will be split up. Optionally, you can load a preview of your document into this panel by clicking the &quot;Load Preview&quot; button to help you decide how many sections you need. You can also click the image to tell Presence to ignore certain sections. So if you know your barcode will appear in the top right of the image, you can click the other sections to remove them from consideration:

[[File:read_barcode_dialog_3.png]]

If the preview is a multi-page PDF or TIFF document, the previous and next page buttons will be enabled to allow you flip between pages.

== Test Panel ==

This allows you to test the barcode scanner and view the results. Click the &quot;Start Test&quot; button to scan the document specified in the &quot;Basics&quot; tab and output the results in the table.

[[File:read_barcode_dialog_4.png]]

{{Actions}}</rev>
        </revisions>
      </page>
      <page pageid="1491" ns="0" title="Read Binary File">
        <revisions>
          <rev contentformat="text/x-wiki" contentmodel="wikitext" xml:space="preserve">== Read Binary File Node ==

The Read Binary File Node can read text from a local or remote location. The location can be in the form of a local path or UNC, a URL, or an FTP site.

The incoming binary file will be stored in a Presence variable for later use in your Task. For instance it can be saved to a file or inserted into a Database.

If binary contents are referenced within some text, it will be represented as a hexidecimal stream. For example, consider that we have read 5 bytes of binary data into a variable called ${binary}. Later in the Task an email is sent out including the following reference:

 Binary data is ${binary}

The result of this will be something along the lines of:

 Binary data is ABCDEF10A5

As you can see the binary data has been converted into hexidecimal.

=== Creating a Read Binary File Node ===

To create a Read Binary File Node, simply drag the Read Binary File icon from the &quot;Actions&quot; Task Element list into your Task. You will then see the options dialog:

[[file:read_binary_file.gif]]

If the file you want to read is on your local machine or network, select &quot;Use local file&quot;. If it is on the internet, select &quot;Use remote file&quot;.

====Enter file location====

This should be the relative or absolute path in the case of local / network files. If it is a URL or on an FTP server, click in the text field to launch the [[File Chooser]] dialog.

====Variable to create ====

This is the name of the variable that Presence should write the contents of the binary file to.

When you are happy with your changes click &quot;Okay&quot; to include the Node in your Task.

Related:

* [[Read Text File]]
* [[Write Text File]]
* [[Write Binary File]]

== See Also ==

{{Actions}}</rev>
        </revisions>
      </page>
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