CueCat Patent Granted, Finally

RobertB-DC writes "Who could forget the :CueCat, the amazing device that would bring 'convergence' between the real world and the online marketing Utopia of the late '90s? Belo, the Dallas-based newspaper and TV conglomerate, spent millions of dollars on the project, only to be ridiculed from the start and eventually becoming a sort of poster kitty for the Dot-Com Bust. Well, the device's inventor and chief cheerleader, J. Jovan Philyaw, didn't forget. His patent application, in progress since 1998, has finally been granted. The story comes from a Dallas alternative weekly, since the local Belo paper is still smarting from its $40-million-dollar black eye."

Re:A day late and $40 Million Dollars Short

[Anonymous Coward]

I still have a dozen cardboard boxes of them, including all PS/2 revisions and the short-lived USB versions, that I used to test my CueCat driver for Linux (here [myspace.voo.be] if you care about abandonware.)

JavaScript :CueCat Decoder

[badc0ffee]

Still available, a web page to decode the cat. http://www.logorrhea.com/cuecat/cuecat_decode.html [logorrhea.com]

Re:I used one

[afidel]

It wasn't in the backup set, it was on my laptop. The only loss if the DB went tits-up was that I would have to go back to hand searching the boxes, it's not like deleting a row in the DB destroyed the tapes =)

Bad Summary

[Zordak]

If you look at the "Related Applications" section, I see something like a score of issued patents in this family, give or take a few. So this is not anything like the "real" :CueCat patent. This is a continuation-in-part, meaning they are adding new matter to the original application (some incremental improvement, usually). Apparently, these guys are intent on patenting every little incremental improvement they can think of for their famous failure. Why? Are they stacking their portfolio with an eye to future litigation? If true, that's the real story.

Re:Brilliant!!

[Zadaz]

Have you tried these? They stink out loud, and it's mostly because of the iPhone's camera, specifically the lack of a macro mode. I was completely unable to get a good reading from anything but a 2 ft wide QR code in bright light. And then it took forever to process it.

My ancient (4 year old) Japanese phone recognized QR codes the size of a postage stamp in real time, even in low light. No need to take a photo, you activate the QR code reader, point your phone at it and the application will stop capturing when it finds good data.

It's also important to note that it's not only used for URLs and marketing, but its an incredibly easy way to share contact info. Most Japanese mobiles recognize this kind of info and with a simple wave of your phone you can add someone's complete contact information to your phone. Just put it on the back of your business card.

Re:I used one

[Tacvek]

It is worth noting that there are two different basic types of CueCat declawing.

The normal format for the CueCat is a long "encypted" string that contains three pieces of information, A serial number, information about the barcode type, and the raw barcode data.

The first type of declawing merely makes the serial number be a sting of dashes or zeros. This was only really useful with the official software, as the unoffensive drivers that support the CueCat's native format normally ignore the serial number.

The second type of declawing, which would be more accurately described as "fixing" (neutering) the CueCat, is a modification that results in the CueCat retuning just the raw barcode data in plaintext, followed by the enter key.

(My understanding is that the CueCat always functions as a keyboard, in all modes, but the official software intercepted the output.)

I vaguely remember that one configuration Code128 bar codes would not scan correctly, but they did work in a different configuration. Does anybody remember what configuration that was? I think it was either the neutered configuration, or the non-neutered configuration when using the official software.

Re:I was actually one of the first to hack it

[rAiNsT0rm]

Heh, I actually found an article that explains it from 2000 and I even got a mention in it :)

http://www.securityfocus.com/news/89 [securityfocus.com]

I just found it now googling for what the legal basis was... I had never read it before... so I gotta thank you for making me curious!

Finally decrypted mine

[macraig]

This news prompted me to drag out my two :Cats and decrypt the output on them, so I can finally use them as raw scanners. I dug out the copper trace to pin 10 of the Hyundai IC on both of them and, voila, it outputs raw numeric ASCII data whenever it spies a barcode. I've had archived details on how to do this for years, but never got a round tuit (those tuits are pretty scarce and hard to find in their own right). Turns out I Googled the part number on the PCBs and found several pages detailing the process for that specific PCB.

BIOS settings needed?

[cant_get_a_good_nick]

I remember those, when they first came out, they seemed stupid. It solved a problem for an advertiser, but never solved anything for the end user. Doomed to failure.

Plus, in the install instructions, it gave instructions on how to reset your BIOS settings if it wasn't recognized. You expect someone to reset BIOS settings to use something not really useful? Whatever.

we used one at my last place, a 'declawed' one was a useful cheap barcode scanner for books.

Re:I used one

[afidel]

No need to solder it, here's [blort.org] a site with drivers for just about every OS including a JAVA decoder if your OS doesn't have a specific driver =)