QR code (abbreviated from Quick Response Code) is the trademark for a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional barcode) first designed for the automotive industry in Japan; a barcode is an optically machine-readable label that is attached to an item and that records information related to that item: The information encoded by a QR code may be made up of four standardized types (“modes”) of data (numeric, alphanumeric, byte / binary, Kanji) or, through supported extensions, virtually any type of data.[1]
The QR Code system has become popular outside the automotive industry due to its fast readability and greater storage capacity compared to standard UPC barcodes. Applications include product tracking, item identification, time tracking, document management, general marketing, and much more.[2]
A QR code consists of black modules (square dots) arranged in a square grid on a white background, which can be read by an imaging device (such as a camera) and processed using Reed-Solomon error correction until the image can be appropriately interpreted; data is then extracted from patterns present in both horizontal and vertical components of the image.[2]
PHP QR Code is open source (LGPL) library for generating QR Code, 2-dimensional barcode. Based on libqrencode C library, provides API for creating QR Code barcode images (PNG, JPEG thanks to GD2). Implemented purely in PHP, with no external dependencies (except GD2 if needed).
Some of library features includes:
- Supports QR Code versions (size) 1-40
- Numeric, Alphanumeric, 8-bit and Kanji encoding. (Kanji encoding was not fully tested, if you are japan-encoding enabled you can contribute by verifing it 🙂 )
- Implemented purely in PHP, no external dependencies except GD2
- Exports to PNG, JPEG images, also exports as bit-table
- TCPDF 2-D barcode API integration
- Easy to configure
- Data cache for calculation speed-up
- Provided merge tool helps deploy library as a one big dependency-less file, simple to “include and do not wory”
- Debug data dump, error logging, time benchmarking
- API documentation
- Detailed examples
- 100% Open Source, LGPL Licensed