Barcode

Just like every individual has its own set of identification details, so does every commercial product. It’s usually found in the form of a barcode, which contain necessary machine-readable characters to identify a product, vendor, and price. You can easily read such types of IDs with the help of Barcode.

For starters, you need to know that Barcode is a Windows Gadget. This means that you have native support for it only if you’re using Windows 7. On the bright side of things, you can install host applications like 8GadgetsPack or Thoosje Sidebar for seamless integration of this particular gadget.

The name of the gadget is pretty suggestive, in the sense that it makes you believe it has something to do with barcodes. It does, and is in fact a method of reading a barcode, more or less. The desktop window is fitted with an input section for the values of interest, as well as a preview section for the actual barcode.

What the gadget does is attempt to recognize the status and originating country of an EAN-13 barcode. This is done by manually providing the barcode values in the input field, summing up a total of 13 digits. The corresponding barcode is built on the spot, and it would have been useful to see a method to save, or at least be able to copy the barcode preview.

In terms of customization, it benefits from all the default settings of a gadget, such as the possibility to adjust opacity level, or make it stay on top of every other window. It also has a set of custom options, which bundle a couple of background pictures, and whether or not to display the barcode picture.

Taking everything into consideration, we can state that Barcode is a lightweight tool which lets you check the status and country of a barcode. However, it can only read EAN-13 codes, but only through input of the digits instead of the barcode picture, which is generated without an option to save.