ZXing-C++

ZXing-C++ (“zebra crossing”) is an open-source, multi-format 1D/2D barcode image processing library implemented in C++.

It was originally ported from the Java ZXing Library but has been developed further and now includes many improvements in terms of quality and performance. It can both read and write barcodes in a number of formats.

Features

• In pure C++17, no third-party dependencies (for the library)
• Stateless, thread-safe readers/scanners and writers/generators
• Wrapper/Bindings for:
  • WinRT
  • Android
  • WebAssembly
  • Python

Supported Formats

Note: DataBar used to be called RSS. DataBar is not supported for writing.

Getting Started

To read barcodes:

As an example, have a look at ZXingReader.cpp. 1. Load your image into memory (3rd-party library required). 2. Call ReadBarcode() from ReadBarcode.h, the simplest API to get a Result.

To write barcodes:

As an example, have a look at ZXingWriter.cpp. 1. Create a MultiFormatWriter instance with the format you want to generate. Set encoding and margins if needed. 2. Call encode() with text content and the image size. This returns a BitMatrix which is a binary image of the barcode where true == visual black and false == visual white. 3. Convert the bit matrix to your native image format. See also the ToMatrix<T>(BitMatrix&) helper function.

Web Demos

• Read barcodes
• Write barcodes
• Scan with camera

WinRT Package

A nuget package is available for WinRT: huycn.zxingcpp.winrt. To install it, run the following command in the Package Manager Console

PM> Install-Package huycn.zxingcpp.winrt

Build Instructions

Standard setup on Windows/macOS/Linux

1. Make sure CMake version 3.14 or newer is installed.
2. Make sure a C++17 compliant compiler is installed (minimum VS 2019 16.8 / gcc 7 / clang 5).
3. See the cmake BUILD_... options to enable the testing code, python wrapper, etc.

Windows Universal Platform

1. Make sure CMake version 3.4 or newer is installed.
2. Make sure a C++17 compliant compiler is installed (minimum VS 2019 16.8).
3. Edit the file wrappers/winrt/BuildWinCom.bat to adjust the path to your CMake installation.
4. Double-click on the batch script to run it.
5. If the build succeeds, it will put the results in the folder UAP which is ready-to-use SDK extension.

Android

1. Install AndroidStudio including NDK and CMake (see ‘SDK Tools’).
2. Open the project in folder wrappers/android.
3. The project contains 2 modules: zxingcpp is the wrapper library, app is the demo app using zxingcpp.

WebAssembly

1. Install Emscripten if not done already.
2. In an empty build folder, invoke emcmake cmake <path to zxing-cpp.git/wrappers/wasm>.
3. Invoke cmake --build . to create zxing.js and zxing.wasm (and _reader/_writer versions).
4. To see how to include these into a working HTML page, have a look at the reader and writer demos.
5. To quickly test your build, copy those demo files into your build directory and run e.g. emrun --serve_after_close demo_reader.html.

You can also download the latest build output from the continuous integration system from the Actions tab. Look for ‘wasm-artifacts’. Also check out the live demos.