Micro QR Code

This is an even smaller, more compact version of the regular QR Code. Also designed by Denso in Japan, Micro QR is intended for use where QR Code would take up too much space or where less data needs to be encoded.

ClosedThe Character Sets and Modes

Micro QR Code is capable of containing the following characters in each of the four different modes.

It is possible to manually switch between modes in a single barcode by encoding the appropriate mode change command as listed below.

If the data stream is Unicode, data that follows ^K and ^B will be converted to the Kanji encoding (see above). Data following ^N and ^A will be converted to the ANSI 1252 (Western languages) encoding.

An example of switching from numeric to alphanumeric to binary would be something like the following (Note the mode change commands are in bold):

^N12345678^AABCDEFG^B1248

If Mode is set to the default setting of Auto, the above mode change commands will not work as this functionality would be handled automatically by BarTender.

ClosedThe Symbology Structure

Micro QR Code contains one position detection pattern and data modules in the data area. The orientation of Micro QR Code is determined by the use of the position detection pattern box in the upper left corner. This pattern allows for the barcode to be scanned properly at any orientation. Data is stored in "modules", or dots, in the data area as binary information. Each black module represents a binary 1 and each white module represents a binary 0. The alignment pattern helps the decoding software re-synchronize in case of slight distortion of the code.

Three selectable levels of Reed-Solomon error correction are available which allow a barcode with up to 25% of damaged codewords to still read properly. The maximum number of characters permitted for this code is 35.

ClosedThe Dimensions

The minimum and maximum sizes for Micro QR are 11x11 modules to 17x17 modules.  The minimum quiet zone on all sides is the equivalent of 2 modules.