Goals:
Please click the [ Mark Complete ] button at the bottom of this page when you’ve achieved the following goals:
-
Be able to:
- Explain to a customer what the Zebra PWA Scanning App is.
- State 4 general benefits of Progressive Web Apps that apply to the Zebra PWA Scanning App.
- Demonstrate how to set up the Zebra PWA Scanning App on a smartphone.
- Demonstrate how to use the Zebra PWA Scanning App on a smartphone.
What is a Progressive Web App?
A Progressive Web App is a software that can function directly from a web page, without the need for installation as an App.
Advantages of PWAs that improve our Zebra product:
- Suitable for mobile devices without any installation – users don’t need to download or install from repositories like Google Apps or Apple Store.
- Behave like native Apps.
- Cheap to develop, promote, demonstrate and maintain.
- Better integration with hardware.
- Because all of the functionality is in a cached web page, there is reduced load on the server.
- They can run offline from saved web pages (but of course, we need online access to fetch data from barcodesdatabase.org).
Click a hyperlink to jump to that point in the Youtube video:
134 – Zebra PWA (Progressive Web App) Scanning App
This replaces the Zebra Barcode Scanner.
PWAs are web pages that function as Apps and thereby bypass the “Stores” like Google App Store and the Apple Store.
This is good for FREE Apps – for example, Windguru.
Online PWA based on barcodesdatabase.org.
One of the problems with our initial Zebra Barcode Scanner was that it was developed by a freelance Developer, and we have no way to update it. One of the biggest updates we need is the ability to scan our barcodes with their leading “0” and show them as EAN-13. Our new PWA can scan 06 and 07 barcodes and return them as EAN-13s.
You can find the new functionality at zebra.barcodesdatabase.org. This sort of works on a desktop PC, with some webcams only.
On a phone, you can open this URL, switch between back or front phone camera (if you have both), and then press START SCANNING. You should then see a Result page with details drawn from barcodesdatabase.org.
The barcode number at the top is a clickable link, and it functions correctly to show the leading “0” as belonging to EAN-13.
The way to get the App on your phone varies, for example – Android – setting up the clickable icon on your phone – simply opens the web page to run the PWA on your phone.
The app is initially only in English.