Barcode or QR scanners with VTAP readers

VTAP readers are designed to read NFC mobile wallet passes, cards and tags. When you begin a transition from using legacy barcode or QR scanners to modern NFC mobile wallet, you may need to support a mixed population of VTAP readers and barcode or QR scanners for some time.

To ease this situation, a VTAP reader can connect to a barcode or QR scanner, either over one of its serial interfaces or wirelessly over Bluetooth. The VTAP reader can receive a payload read by a scanner and send this on, over any of the VTAP interfaces, including Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) keyboard or BLE GATT.

In this way both barcode/QR data and NFC card or wallet pass data can be sent on to a host system over a single interface from the VTAP reader.

The barcode type(s) supported depend only on the capabilities of the scanner connected. The VTAP reader will pass on to a host system whatever data comes from the scanner, over a serial or Bluetooth interface.

There are a number of scenarios where this functionality might be especially useful:

• Point‑of‑Sale (PoS) terminal at a café/retail outlet, which has limited space or connection options for supporting both a barcode reader and a VTAP reader at the same time.

• Ticket checking turnstiles for events, which need a very simple way to read a wide range of barcodes, QR codes, NFC cards/tags, mobile wallet and smart watch passes, and wearables.

• Gym or private members club access applications, which need to read a wide range of barcodes, QR codes, NFC cards/tags, mobile wallet and smart watch passes.

Setting up this facility requires a few changes to the config.txt file on your VTAP reader, which are described in this page. If you need information about how configuration changes work more generally, please refer to Edit config.txt.