During my many years of service as an IT guy in Lousiana, I had a lot of experience with bar code readers. From high-end Symbol handhelds to low-end pen readers (man, I hate pen readers), I’ve seen them all. One thing that has never made sense to me is why they’re not incorporated into more technology. It’s a simple enough piece of machinery, it seems only logical that it be built into my keyboard. Or my mouse. Oh, hey. Look. Now it is built into my mouse. Elecom has released this little ditty to the delight of warehouse managers everywhere. The mouse can read both the monochrome and color 2D barcodes known as QR barcodes (they’re the box looking ones, not the long row of line ones). Now, make me one that reads conventional barcodes too, and we might have a deal.
A mouse with a QR reader and Color QR [Akihabara News via Oh Gizmo]