Comments on: QR Codes in the OPAC?

By: Andrew Isherwood

Andrew Isherwood — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 09:44:54 +0000

Howdo Mr P

I'm looking at integrating QR codes into our catalogue. Have you documented anywhere what method you're using to generate the images on the fly? I've looked at a couple of methods, all cumbersome

Cheers
Mr Ish

By: Dave Pattern

Dave Pattern — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:51:31 +0000

I'm in the same boat too, Laurence — my mobile phone (supplied by MPOW) is so old that it'll soon aquire that "retro chic"!

I'd hoped to catch Andy at JISC09, but didn't quite manage it

As soon as I get a spare 10 minutes, I'm going to change our codes to give title/floor/shelfmark.

On the plus side, colleagues in the library have just been awarded some funding to look at various aspects of mobile phone technology (well done Andrew!).

By: Laurence Lockton

Laurence Lockton — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:12:10 +0000

Hi Dave,

I've just added QR codes to our catalogue record display, giving title, author and call number as text, encouraged by our head of e-learning, Andy Ramsden . I'm using the Google Chart API . I wonder whether it would be usefully combined with a "shopping basket," or is the appeal that it's just there, it doesn't require any further clicks? I'm somewhat disadvantaged by not owning a camera phone either!
Cheers,
Laurence

By: Examples of Using QR Codes in the Library OPAC…03.20.09 « The Proverbial Lone Wolf Librarian’s Weblog

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 14:58:46 +0000

[...] 2 On March 10th, 2009, Owen Stephens said: If you do want to embed QR codes though, you could have a look athttp://ouseful.wordpress.com/2008/10/25/printing-out-online-course-materials-with-embedded-movie-links/ – Tony Hirst uses http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ to generate QR codes and embed them – it looks like it would be relatively easy to do this as Kaywa allows you to produce an image based on a URL containing the text you want to be encoded in the QR – in this case the location details. [...]

By: Dave Pattern

Dave Pattern — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 17:54:14 +0000

Hi Matthew

That's pretty much what we're thinking doing — the user scans the QR code and gets something like:

Advanced Chemistry – Floor 3, 341.345GER

At the moment we're encoding a URL, so we're able to track usage (which is something we couldn't do with encoding text unless the user needed to click on something to display the QR code?)

By: Matthew Phillips

Matthew Phillips — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:22:17 +0000

I quite like the idea, but I think I would prefer just text: a few words from title/author and the call number. I see this being useful for users tracking down the books on the shelf: it's amazing how many try to avoid writing shelfmarks down.

One aspect is usage. How can you measure how many people are taking photos of your QR codes? If you're linking to the catalogue with the QR code, perhaps you can include a tracer in the URL to be picked up in your logs. If you do this, please let us know how popular it is.

By: QR-Code in Bibliothek « Zukunftswerkstatt 2009

QR-Code in Bibliothek « Zukunftswerkstatt 2009 — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:35:10 +0000

[...] Kollege Dave Pattern stellte sich auf seinem Blog die Frage, ob irgendwelche Bibliothek schon ausprobiert hat QR-Code in OPAC einzusetzen. [...]

By: Ian G

Ian G — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:57:10 +0000

Only other example I have seen is Bath.

By: Paul S.

Paul S. — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 16:57:04 +0000

I do like the idea of QR codes (irrationally, because I don't even own a camera phone) far out of proportion with their probable usefulness… because they're just so incredibly "Tomorrow's World", aren't they?

By: Peter Murray

Peter Murray — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 14:23:31 +0000

Cool — I just looked into QR Codes and installed an app on my phone. I suppose the question now is: what's the uptake of QR Codes in the U.S.? I haven't seen them in the wild here, and I had to go to a company in Taiwan to get an app for my phone.