Barcodes printed using Firefox

    I've run into an interesting problem lately, and haven't
heard 
anyone else ask about it, so I thought I would.

    I'm having trouble with our barcode scanners reading
OCLC 
Interlibrary Loan "Request Identifier" barcodes. 
It does fine when the 
request form is printed using Internet Explorer or CLIO, but
it doesn't 
scan at all when the same request is printed using Firefox,
those 
barcodes are noticeably different.  In fact the print
version, on the FF 
screen, _shows_ a barcode that _is_ scanable.  I did a
screen grab and 
pasted it into Photoshop and printed it, it scans great, but
when you 
print the request form out using Firefox, it prints a
different (and 
unscanable) barcode. 

    Of course, I cannot find any references on the
manufacturer's web 
site (Metrologic), Mozilla, or the OCLC site, even backed up
and punted 
on Google.  Anyone out there have a working knowledge on why
FF might 
handle barcodes differently, and how to squish it? 

Thanks!  Richard


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Just a guess, but have you tried using more than one
printer, or
printing through Firefox on multiple machines against
multiple printers.
I figure that there are two possibilities:

1. There is something inherently buggy about Firefox's
printing
capabilities with barcodes, or at least those barcodes.

2. A uniqe combination of printer + buggy printer driver +
Firefox
causes a failure on your particular machine, and any other
similarly
configured machines. If you can replicate the bug on
multiple machines
and printers with different configurations, then you have
definitely
found a Firefox bug, and will get a gold star by reporting
it to their
bug tracking software.

Good luck.

- David

---
David Cloutman <dcloutmanco.marin.ca.us>
Electronic Services Librarian
Marin County Free Library 

-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib-bounceswebjunction.org
[mailto:web4lib-bounceswebjunction.org] On Behalf Of Richard
Samford
Sent: Friday, February 15, 2008 9:33 AM
To: Interlibrary Loan Listserv; web4libwebjunction.org
Subject: [Web4lib] Barcodes printed using Firefox



    I've run into an interesting problem lately, and haven't
heard 
anyone else ask about it, so I thought I would.

    I'm having trouble with our barcode scanners reading
OCLC 
Interlibrary Loan "Request Identifier" barcodes. 
It does fine when the 
request form is printed using Internet Explorer or CLIO, but
it doesn't 
scan at all when the same request is printed using Firefox,
those 
barcodes are noticeably different.  In fact the print
version, on the FF

screen, _shows_ a barcode that _is_ scanable.  I did a
screen grab and 
pasted it into Photoshop and printed it, it scans great, but
when you 
print the request form out using Firefox, it prints a
different (and 
unscanable) barcode. 

    Of course, I cannot find any references on the
manufacturer's web 
site (Metrologic), Mozilla, or the OCLC site, even backed up
and punted 
on Google.  Anyone out there have a working knowledge on why
FF might 
handle barcodes differently, and how to squish it? 

Thanks!  Richard


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