What is compliance?

Absolutely necessary! Barcodes that do not scan are not just an inconvenience to your customer. They cause key entry and resulting errors in data about your products. Lost visibility in the supply chain and extra costs for your customers could result in loss of the customer, a claim for damages or both.

What is Application Specification Verification?

Aside from print quality there are other factors that determine how well a barcode based system will actually work. The height of the barcode, the X-Dim, the data encoded, the symbology used, etc. to name a few.  These characteristics are usually in what is called an application specification.  There are application specifications for retail, healthcare, defense, automotive, electronics, blood banks, etc. You can think of it as another level of verification.  It is becoming more important as industries start to use the added data handling capability in 2D barcodes.  They can now encode multiple fields in a single barcode and that opens up new important applications for many.  However, the multiple fields present a challenge for label design and IT folks because of the complex encoding rules and hidden field separation characters. If you get the format or content wrong it is as bad as a non-scannable barcode. Retail, healthcare and automotive applications requiring multiple field barcodes are on the rise.

What is interoperability?

Many industries allow users to choose between linear or 2D symbologies.  Many will use both types to satisfy their disparate customer base.  In addition, some will add RFID tagging to accommodate client requirements.  These AIDC technologies are expected to work transparently (interoperable) in those industry supply chains.