If you are trying to use a scanner to scan in rental tickets you may have noticed that the barcode contains a leading hyphen. (-)
Meaning the barcode here for Jun0030-20 on this ticket
is actually stored as:
-Jun0030-20
Why do we do this?
The prefix (-) is there to identify the type of data when using BRM in handsfree mode.
In Handsfree mode you can operate certain functions of BRM with only a scanner. No keyboard, no decisions, just scanning. Of course, you can only do a limited range of functions in this way, but it is very hand for doing certain repetitive tasks quickly and efficiently:
- recording servicing of bikes
- checking bikes out
- checking bikes in
Searching via barcode
we have put in a feature to allow searching for reservations by scanning a ticket into regular search.
If you do try to scan tickets in regular mode (not handsfree) the hyphen would ordinarily stop you finding what you want so we allow it:
See Also