Official Dukten Blog

Dukten featured in KillerStartups

Dukten — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 19:55:28 +0000

We got a message from KillerStartups.com telling us that a review of Dukten was featured on their site today. KillerStartups is a startups blog and Internet community visited by Entrepreneurs and investors looking for the next big success story.
These are good news and will help more people know the website, please vote for us on KillerStartups website, here is the link:

http://www.killerstartups.com/Search/dukten-com-the-definitive-database-of-products

Benefits of using barcodes

Dukten — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 03:50:46 +0000

Every day millions of barcodes are scanned at point of sale systems. Retailers depend on them to improve customer service and lower costs.

Here are some of the benefits of using barcodes:

Speeds up checkout process helping retailers to serve customers faster which translates to more sales.

Reduce pricing and inventory errors. Human error rate for data entry is one error per 300 characters. Barcode scanners average error rate is one error in 36 trillion characters.

Reduce costs. Having UPC barcodes on your merchandise instead of having to price tag every item saves time and reduces handling costs.

Faster access to information. Barcodes can help you on better decision making to gain opportunities.

Dukten knows how wonderful barcodes and other product identification systems like RFID are and that’s why we are committed to create the most complete product database on the Internet. Your contribution is really appreciated.

Pure white background pictures with Phothosop

Dukten — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 06:00:29 +0000

Product pictures with a pure white background look great in online product catalogs, however it’s difficult to get a perfect white on the back using only lights and a digital camera; most of the times the picture will need a bit of image editing software help.

There are several techniques to get this. Here we show you a tutorial we found about one way to do it using a mask and the levels and curves dialogs. We tried it and it really works, you can turn a picture like this:

into this:

And here is the tutorial:

http://jyoseph.com/give-a-drab-lightbox-photo-a-crisp-white-background-with-photoshop-tutorial/

try it! hope you like it.

8 interesting facts about barcodes

Dukten — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 06:06:51 +0000

1.- “barcode” is improper spelling. Rather, it should be spelled as two words; bar code.

2.- The first commercial barcode scanning operation took place in 1974 in Troy, Ohio at Marsh’s Supermarket. The item was a Wrigley’s Doublemint Gum.

3.- Contrary to popular belief, the UPC (the most well-known bar code that you find in almost any product), doesn’t contain the price of the product, just a number that identifies the item.

4.- statistically, the typical typist will make one mistake in 300 keystrokes. The chance of a misread bar code symbol is somewhere between one in a million and one in four trillion!

5.- Laser and image scanners work at a speed of about 40 to 200 scans-per-second.

6.- a “light pen” is not the same as a “bar code wand”. The former is a device that is used for drawing directly off the computer screen, the latter is used for scanning bar codes.

7.- UPC barcodes are scanned in only one dimension, so only widths of the bars and spaces matter, not height.

8.- there are over a hundred of different bar code symbologies invented, however, only a half-dozen are used regularly.

You can read a barcode using only your eyesight

Dukten — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 06:30:31 +0000

Although it might seem that barcodes are very complex and just a computer can decode it, the truth is that the way they work is very simple.

UPC Barcodes are made up of a series of vertical lines with different thickness and a number below them. Well, the information that those lines encode is no other than the same number that you can read with your eyes, just that they are designed for a reliable read from a machine, usually a laser scanner.

Ok, now that you know what information is in those lines, this is how to read them:

The barcode is composed by black and white lines. Both are important.
Lines in UPC barcodes can have four different thickness. The skinniest line will be our unit reference for a number 1 and the thickest will be our reference for a number 4. Once you detected the skinniest line, then you can compare it and find the next thicker line and that will be the reference for number 2. Lines with a thickness between this and the thickest will be a 3.
Every barcode starts and ends with a 101 (thin black, thin white, thin black). Also every UPC barcode has a 01010 (thin white, thin black, thin white, thin black, thin white) in the very middle. You can detect this 01010 because there are two lines sticking down the numbers.
Each number is made up of four lines which together occupies the same space (if you add them they will be 7 units wide).
Once you know this you can use the following code table to decode each digit :
So, the barcode above starts with 101-3211-1411 where the 101 just marks the beginning of the barcode, it’s not a digit. The 3211 is the digit 0 and 1411 is digit 3

What is the difference between UPC and SKU?

Dukten — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 16:24:55 +0000

Are UPC (Universal Product Code) the same as SKU (Stock Keeping Unit)? No, they are not. Both codes are used to identify products, but in a different way.

UPC codes are standarized by an international association called GS1 who assigns each manufacturer a unique prefix for using in their UPC barcodes; then the rest of the UPC code is chosen by the manufacturer who ensures each product variation receives a unique code.
The UPC is affixed to the product all through its life cycle, starting from manufacturing till it’s in the customer’s hands.
On the other hand, SKUs may be numeric or alphanumerical and are assigned by each company for stock keeping purposes and internal operations. This means that it is the company, store or retailer who decides the format of the SKU code depending on its needs. SKUs must be unique only inside the same company. A product will have a different SKU on two different companies.

In conclusion, UPC are for universal use and SKUs are for internal use.

UPC vs SKU

External related links:

Difference between UPC and SKU
http://www.differencebetween.net/miscellaneous/difference-between-upc-and-sku/

Universal Product Code (UPC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Product_Code

Stock Keeping Unit (SKU)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock-keeping_unit

Are the description and price included in barcodes?

Dukten — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 15:26:10 +0000

People wonder if barcodes have descriptive information encoded in them like prices or product names. The answers is generally no. So how does the point of sales systems know the product that is scanning? Well, UPC barcodes (the ones that you see almost in any product at the supermarket) encode just a big number that uniquely identifies the product worldwide. When the cashier scans that product, the point of sale computer reads that number and then looks for the product details in a local database. That database can contain information like the product name, the price, available promotions, pictures, etc.

However, there are exceptions, like barcodes used in variable measure items which do include the price of the item.

Wearable Bluetooth ring barcode scanner

Dukten — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 16:42:55 +0000

Mobile workers who need to scan barcodes will love this ring scanner manufactured by LXE which allows you to operate it hands-free while you carry out other tasks.
It has a Bluetooth module to transmit wirelessly data up to 30 feet away and is able to scan 1D and 2D barcodes.
A futuristic proposition that could be a good solution for all those who need to be in constant movement.

Creative barcodes

Dukten — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 07:50:15 +0000

Everybody knows how a barcode looks like. They are just a series of vertical lines with different thickness which together form a rectangle and have a number below. But, do they have to be that boring? The answer is no.
As long as the scanners can read them, they can look more creative as a Japanese company realized. They work with manufacturers of barcode labels to create innovative and eye catching barcodes.

This is another way to call buyer’s attention and nowadays it is very used in Japanese products and surely will be used in other countries as well.

Barcode art

Related links:

Barcode Art From Japan: Black & White CAN Get Along!
http://inventorspot.com/articles/barcode_art_from_japan_black_white_can_get_along_12735

Tweet and Facebook like buttons in product details

Dukten — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 07:35:02 +0000

Now you can share to your friends the products that you like in Dukten.
Simply click the “I like” or “Tweet” button and the product title, barcode and link will be posted to your wall in facebook or twitter so your contacts can check the items that you like or recommend.