QR Codes: Quick Facts - LSC-CyFair
A QR code was placed inside a tag attached to a Friends of the Library book bag announcing their traveling book bag adventure contest. The other side of the tag lists a URL for alternative access to the information.
QR codes were added to the sign outside library study rooms, listing three ways to schedule a room: text, phone, or email. Below each tag, there is a listing of the text number, phone number, and email address, respectively, for alternative access to the information.
A QR code may contain the following data:
- text information
- phone numbers
- text messaging
- microblogging
- URL/Internet address
- contact information
- calendar event
- email address
Scan QR codes with a smartphone or other web-enabled electronic device equipped with a camera and free QR code scanner application such as RedLaser.
Get more details and try it yourself!
- Watch this short Common Craft video on QR codes.
- Try the QR Codes for Kids video created by LSC-CyFair Librarians!
- Create your own QR codes with Delivr to show friends, colleagues, and family how tech-savvy you are!
- Check out the Texas Library Journal article on QR codes (PDF) written by a librarian from LSC-CyFair!
- See if you can find QR codes to scan at various locations in the library!
QR code basics:
- Created in 1994 by a Japanese automobile parts company (now named Denso Wave Incorporated) to track inventory.
- Known alternatively as quick response code.
- Released the specifications and code itself to be freely used but Denso Wave kept the patent rights.
- Contains up to 4296 alphanumeric characters, much more than a regular barcode.
- Read in any direction (using three unique squares in the code's three corners) with a free QR code scanner application available at mobile device online stores.
- Scan codes only from sources you recognize like libraries, colleges, museums, newspapers, etc.
Sources:
"About 2D Code." QR Code.com. Denso Wave Incorporated, n.d. Web. 13. Dec. 2011.
"Inventor of the QR Code Develops a New Reader Application." PR Newswire. PR Newswire Association LLC, 9 June 2011 Web. 13 Dec. 2011.
Schottmuller, Angie. "Top 14 Things Marketers Need to Know about QR Codes." Search Engine Watch. Incisive Interactive Marketing LLC, 26 Apr. 2011. Web. 7 Dec. 2011.
Page Maintained by: M.Norem-Reference Librarian
monica.r.norem@lonestar.edu
