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IDAutomation POSTNET and OneCode Font Advantage Package

A license is required for each computer this software is installed on;
this software may only be used according to the License Agreement.
Demo versions of this software may be used for evaluation purposes only

NOTE: To create proper barcode types, IDAutomation provides several Font Tools that are free to use with IDAutomation fonts. The font tools automatically format the characters to the barcode font. When it is only necessary to create a single barcode, IDAutomation recommends using the Online Font Encoder.

Demo Version Note:
The sample fonts provided in the demo version may be used for evaluation purposes only. The only restriction in the demo version is a watermark at the top of some digits. The watermark will not appear in the licensed version. All sample fonts include the letter "S" in the name to differentiate them from the licensed version.

INDEX:

POSTNET Font Advantage Package features

IDAutomation's POSTNET Font Advantage Package is much more than just a few fonts. This package contains several different font versions in 6 different font formats. Included are font tools, macros and source code to help integrate the fonts into an application. Details of the package are as follows:

Installation instructions

To install the package in Windows, run the INSTALL.EXE setup utility. This utility will install the most commonly used fonts. The following describes how to manually install a font in Windows:

Installing the fonts on Macintosh OS X:

  1. Drag or copy and paste the TrueType font file(s) ending in TTF to the Library/Fonts folder.
  2. To activate the fonts, restart the application - some applications may require you to restart the computer.
  3. The font should now be active in the font menu of your application.

To install the TrueType font on the Classic Macintosh (OS 7.1 - OS 9):

  1. Download and install Stuffit Expander on your Macintosh if you do not have an expander utility that can open ZIP files and decode MacBinary files.
  2. Open the ZIP distribution file that contains the fonts by dragging the ZIP file on the Stuffit Expander icon. The font files will be extracted from the ZIP distribution file and will appear in a subfolder of the folder you placed the ZIP file in. Open this subfolder to view the font files.  At this point, you may want to view the documentation supplied with the font files. To do so just drag the file "readme.html" to the Netscape or Internet Explorer icon.
  3. Now we must decode the files from MacBinary format. Drag the font files that you wish to use that end with "mtt" to the Stuffit Expander icon.
  4. Drag the decoded font files to the System - Fonts folder.
  5. Restart the application you wish to use the font with.
  6. The font will be active in the font menu of your application.

PCL Fonts:
To obtain information about installing PCL fonts, please refer to the PCLinfo.html document provided in the PCL folder of the package.

Font installation procedures for other operating systems are provided here

 Implementation of USPS symbologies

Obtaining the Data to Encode:

Before data is encoded in the barcode, it must be formatted properly. The links below will provide the information necessary to create a single string of text that is to be encoded:

Formatting data to the font:

Start, stop and checksum characters must be added to all Postnet, Planet and Code 128 barcodes to create a symbol that can be read by the USPS. IDAutomation recommends using the font tools to automatically add the required start, stop and checksum characters to the barcode font.

In some cases the font tools may not be needed. If the check digit is already pre-calculated or included in the data for a Postnet or Planet barcode, it is only necessary to place the Start and Stop characters "(" or parenthesis ")" around the data before the font is applied and ensure the data does not contain any spaces or dashes. For example, the ZIP code data of 12345-6789 would be (1234567895) after the check digit is applied and the Start/Stop characters added. To manually calculate the check digit, please refer to the Check Digit Calculation Example in the USPS FAQ. IDAutomation's On-line Barcode Font Encoder may be used to verify check digits, or to create bar codes one at a time.

A font tool must be used to generate the text string for the OneCode font because of the complex encoding algorithms used in this symbology. When a font tool cannot be implemented, OneCode may be printed by accessing a database that already contains the text string formatted to the font. The Word mail-merge example included in this package works in this way; a merge field in Word is linked to a column in Excel that contains the text formatted formatted to the font.

Printing and Font Size:

After the data is formatted to the font and the appropriate font selected, it may be printed. The font size of 12 should be used when printing all OneCode, Postnet and Planet barcodes. FIM symbols should be printed with a font size of 36. The Code 128 font used for EAN128 should be printed at 16 points for USPS Special Services. More information about the sizing of the fonts is provided in the Specifications section.

 Specifications for the fonts in the package

IDAutomation suggests printing the fonts at the recommended point sizes specified in this section. When TrueType, PostScript or OpenType fonts are used, the size may be further adjusted by changing the font point size. For example, to print the 12 point POSTNET font slightly wider, increase the font size to 12.2 points.

The following are specifications for the IDAutomationPOSTNET and IDAutomationPLANET fonts in this package.

Parameter Approximate Font Dimensions at 12 points USPS Dimension Standards
X Dimension (width of bars) .017" .015" - .025"
Width of space between bars .027" .012" - .040"
Vertical size of 4CB character "Full" .180" .134" - .230"
Vertical size of 4CB character "Tracker" .050" .021" - .080"
Height of Postnet short bar .051" .040" - .060"
Height of Postnet tall bar .126" .115" - .135"
Number of bars per inch  23  22 - 24

Specifications for the OCR-A Font IDAutomationOCRa:

Font Point Size CPI ANSI Size
IDAutomationOCRa 9 10 1

Specifications for the Code 128 Font IDAutomationC128L:

Parameter Approximate Font Dimensions at 16 points USPS Dimension Standards
X Dimension .0135" .013" - .020"
Height of bars .75" .75" - .80"
Parameter Approximate Font Dimensions at 21 points
X Dimension .017"
Height of bars  1"

Supported implementations, font names and compatible functions:

Implementation Font Name to use Function to use in Font Tools
Postnet Barcode IDAutomationPOSTNET * Postnet()
Planet Barcode IDAutomationPLANET * Postnet()
OCR-A Text IDAutomationOCRa na
Code 128 Barcode IDAutomationC128L Code128() or USPS_EAN128()
OneCode Barcode IDAutomationPOSTNET * OneCode() **
or IDAutomation_Uni_OneCode()  **
FIM Barcode IDAutomationFIM na

* The IDAutomationPOSTNET and IDAutomationPLANET fonts are also supplied in different narrow intensities which may be needed depending on the area the symbol is printed to and the printer that is used:

** Currently, OneCode is supported by Font Tools that are Feature Level 7 or greater including the Crystal Reports UFL and the Windows DLL.

OneCode barcodes may be produced from IDAutomation's font tools or other encoders, such as those provided by the USPS. To accommodate both types of encoding, each 4-State symbol element is placed at two character locations within the POSTNET font according to the following table:

4-State Symbol Element Character Locations
Ascender A, q
Descender D, r
Full Bar F, p
Tracker T, s

USPS uses the uppercase letters for encoding while IDAutomation font tools use the lower case letters. This provides complete compatibility with the IDAutomation Universal Barcode Font, which allows generation of OneCode, Postnet and Planet, as well as Code 128, Code 39 and Interleaved 2 of 5 symbols from a single font.

Manual check character calculations

IDAutomation provides several font tools, macros and source code samples that are free to use with IDAutomation fonts that automatically format the data to the barcode fonts. Additionally, IDAutomation's Barcode Components automatically perform all necessary calculations. Therefore, manual check digit calculations are usually not necessary.

To manually calculate the check digit for the Postnet barcode:

  1. Ensure the start/stop character is added to the beginning and ending of every Postnet barcode. When using IDAutomation's Postnet Fonts, the parentheses are used for start and stop characters; "(" for start and ")" for stop. Start and stop codes are also located at the "!, *, s, and S" characters in the font.
  2. The last digit of the printed POSTNET barcode symbol is a check digit. The check digit is obtained by determining the number that when added to the sum of all numbers of the data in the POSTNET code will produce a multiple of 10. For example; the check digit for the POSTNET number of 33727-1426 is 5 because (3+3+7+2+7+1+4+2+6=35 and 35+5=40) Therefore, the sum of all POSTNET data including the check digit must be a multiple of 10.
  3. The actual font characters used to print this POSTNET code would be (3372714265).
  4. IDAutomation's On-line Barcode Font Encoder may be used to verify check digits, or to create bar codes one at a time.

To manually calculate the check digits for USPS EAN128, please refer to the USPS section of the Code 128 FAQ.

The USPS 4-CB OneCode (4-State Customer Barcode) is very complex to create and contains many more calculations than a simple check digit. The source code used to create OneCode can be provided with the purchase of the Unlimited Developer License and a signed Source Code License Agreement for one of the products supporting OneCode.

Other barcode software products

IDAutomation has many other products to offer for barcoding purposes including:

 

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