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Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

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Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#131

Post by IanCal »

ricardobeat wrote: post #129
IanCal wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you wrote numbers or letters as precisely as the triangles are drawn in the example, I doubt computers would have much of a problem reading them. We've got fast algorithms for digit classification that are pretty much perfect on the MNIST dataset with just 0.21% error (and I'm pretty sure there are errors in the dataset itself, which brings the real error rate down). MNIST is an easy image recognition task compare…

Machine-readable codes also have space-efficient error correction built in, something that plain text does not support. A text label can become unusable with the loss of a single character.

Only if the code has no error correction built in. If the code is presented to the user to write down it's perfectly possible to have redundancy in the code.

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#132

Post by kragen »

So, even though this is kind of fake (it’s more like a hand-drawn UPC barcode alternative), a real hand-drawn QR-code alternative is something I’ve been thinking about doing for a while. In particular, I was thinking that matrix parity codes like the ones schoen at the EFF discovered in printer dots https://w2.eff.org/Privacy/printers/docucolor/ would be an ECC that’s practical to compute by hand, and then you could draw ECC-correctable matrix barcodes with a pencil.

Has anybody done this?

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#133

Post by samfpetersen »

bengali3 wrote: post #56

Sam, Cool stuff. I get what you're doing here, but from these comments I think QR code reference really throws people off. While comparing to QR might explain how it works, I would do my best to position this as nothing like QR codes (and highlight use cases that make it unique from QR) to avoid the comparison.

Thanks! I think you're right, I'm going to get rid of the QR code reference in the landing page headline. Maybe just 'Hand-drawn, scannable web links'. I will then have an FAQ box that says 'How is this different than a QR code?' where I list a lot of the feedback I got from this thread.

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#134

Post by [deleted] »

bengali3 wrote: post #56

Sam, Cool stuff. I get what you're doing here, but from these comments I think QR code reference really throws people off. While comparing to QR might explain how it works, I would do my best to position this as nothing like QR codes (and highlight use cases that make it unique from QR) to avoid the comparison.

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#135

Post by [deleted] »

bengali3 wrote: post #56

Sam, Cool stuff. I get what you're doing here, but from these comments I think QR code reference really throws people off. While comparing to QR might explain how it works, I would do my best to position this as nothing like QR codes (and highlight use cases that make it unique from QR) to avoid the comparison.

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#136

Post by bengali3 »

samfpetersen wrote: post #133
bengali3 wrote: post #56

Sam, Cool stuff. I get what you're doing here, but from these comments I think QR code reference really throws people off. While comparing to QR might explain how it works, I would do my best to position this as nothing like QR codes (and highlight use cases that make it unique from QR) to avoid the comparison.

Thanks! I think you're right, I'm going to get rid of the QR code reference in the landing page headline. Maybe just 'Hand-drawn, scannable web links'. I will then have an FAQ box that says 'How is this different than a QR code?' where I list a lot of the feedback I got from this thread.

Agreed. There's still no easy way to get from physical to digital. Be sure to focus on the problem you are solving. Show how many mediums can be used as well to solve the problem. (chalk, toothpicks, box of pencils, bricks etc.) Maybe even one page dedicated to each use case. (retailers, restaurants, street performers, celeb events, app unlock codes, etc) some other thoughts:

How can I get someone walking by my restaurant/store who has a question or is looking for more info to interact with my website and get today's coupon?

Be sure to allow camera photos/screenshots to be used via app. If I can scan a tag i see in a video or on a page then that's one more use case.

Your tag is simple enough, can I draw it myself in your app if it doesn't scan, or correct it if its unrecognizable? Knowing I can sketch it manually in your app might avoid some frustration.

Maybe reach out to some snapchat star and brainstorm innovative use cases you can highlight (xyz was here etc?) good luck!

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#137

Post by vessenes »

samfpetersen wrote: post #8
vessenes wrote: post #2

I love this! For it to be compelling, it needs to be readable in a bunch of iOS / Android barcode scanners, though. Any plans there?

That would be cool; they'd have to interact with the meshtag database in order to retrieve the data. I can dream though!

You should get in touch, offer to provide code and cut them some stock options. It would help solve the big question of uptake for an investor.

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#139

Post by ricardobeat »

IanCal wrote: post #131
ricardobeat wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Machine-readable codes also have space-efficient error correction built in, something that plain text does not support. A text label can become unusable with the loss of a single character.

Only if the code has no error correction built in. If the code is presented to the user to write down it's perfectly possible to have redundancy in the code.

Then it's not plain text anymore (not human readable)...

Re: Show HN: A Hand-Drawn QR Code Alternative

#140

Post by IanCal »

ricardobeat wrote: post #139
IanCal wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if the code has no error correction built in. If the code is presented to the user to write down it's perfectly possible to have redundancy in the code.

Then it's not plain text anymore (not human readable)...

How so? You can easily have error correcting codes that are human readable.
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