USPS OneCode Barcodes

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3 Oct 2008Apache2 min read

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USPS One Code - Intelligent Mail Barcode (4-State Customer Barcode) - implementation with VB 2008

Introduction

This is not a typical article. The focus is on Intelligent Mail Barcode (4 State Customer Barcode) or USPS OneCode implementation as a direct solution for anyone who needs it. The downloads include one VB.NET and one C# class – VS2008 with .NET 3.5 syntax - that generate the string expression of OneCode barcodes and decode a barcode string. The code (uncommented) is a modified fraction of the Pathenon project (covers all known 1D and 2D barcodes) that you will read here on The Code Project in the near future, hopefully. I've noticed that there is no related article, so there you are with an ASAP solution for this new USPS symbology.

Basic Information

Intelligent Mail Barcode, also known as the USPS OneCode Solution or USPS 4-State Customer Barcode (abbreviated 4CB, 4-CB, or USPS4CB), is the latest barcode symbology of the United States Postal Services. It combines routing ZIP code information and tracking information into a single 4-state code. It effectively encodes data from POSTNET and PLANET barcodes into a single barcode while providing a greater range of tracking data.

A 4-state barcode is based on a tracker with ascenders and descenders. The four possible states are tracker (neither ascender nor descender), full (both ascender and descender), ascender only, and descender only. The Intelligent Mail barcode consists of 65 bars as a result of encoding data fields of the following types:

Tracking Code

Barcode Identifier as 2 digits (2nd digit must be 0–4)
Service Type Identifier as 3 digits
Mailer Identifier as 6 or 9 digits and
Serial Number as 9 (when used with 6 digit Mailer ID) or 6 (when used with 9 digit Mailer ID) digits

Routing Code

Delivery Point ZIP Code as 0, 5, 9, or 11 digits

The above fields, with a maximum of 31 digits in length, are encoded via a complex process (involving big integers and transposed lookups) to bars expressed as a string with 65 characters in the range of A, D, T, F. More information and specifications can be found here.