Usage

First Start

Open your Grocy website. Click on Settings in the top right corner and then click on Manage API keys. Click on add and copy the long API key to your clipboard. You can now open Barcode Buddy by visiting your webservers URL. The setup will first let you create a user and then ask you to enter the API details. Make sure to have the trailing “/api/” for your Grocy URL at the end.

Using The Web UI

Overview

When you open the web ui, you will see three cards:

  • New Barcodes: Barcodes that are unknown to Grocy, but the name could be looked up

  • Unknown Barcodes: Barcodes that are unknown to Grocy and could not be looked up

  • Processed Barcodes: A history of all barcodes that were processed by Barcode Buddy

If you have entered a barcode that is linked to a Grocy product with the tare feature enabled, a fourth section will pop-up named “Actions required”, where you can enter the weight for the product.

Special Barcodes

There are seven special barcodes - if you scan the barcode, Barcode Buddy goes into a different mode: Eg. in Purchase mode all barcodes that are scanned will be added to Grocys inventory.

Mode

Default Barcode

Explanation

Consume

BBUDDY-C

All items scanned in this mode will be removed from the inventory

Consume (spoiled)

BBUDDY-CS

All items scanned in this mode will be removed from the inventory and marked as spoiled

Consume all

BBUDDY-CA

All products scanned in this mode will have all stock removed from their inventory

Purchase

BBUDDY-P

All items scanned in this mode will be added to the inventory

Open

BBUDDY-O

All items scanned in this mode will be marked as opened

Inventory

BBUDDY-I

Displays the current amount of items in stock of that product

Add to shoppinglist

BBUDDY-AS

All items scanned in this mode will be added to the default shopping list

Quantity

BBUDDY-Q-?

Sets a quantity for a barcode. Replace ? with number of items. Eg. if you have a carton with 10 eggs, scan the barcode BBUDDY-Q-10 and then the barcode of the carton. The next time you scan the carton barcode, it will register as 10 units.

You can find printable copies of the barcodes in the example folder .

Using the UI

Once a barcode was added and is not recognised by Grocy, it will be added to the list in the web ui. Simply select the Grocy product from the drop-down list. If the name could be looked up, you will also see checkboxes for each word that was used in the name. If you want the selected Grocy product preselected for a different barcode that includes such a word, tick it and then press either “Consume” or “Add”. The barcode will then saved to Grocy and the next time you scan it, the product will automatically be processed.

https://github.com/Forceu/barcodebuddy/raw/master/example/screenshots/FullSite_small.png

Adding Barcodes

Adding Barcodes Manually

The easiest option, ideally for testing out Barcode Buddy: Simply open the web ui and click on “Add barcode”. Enter the barcode (use one line per barcode) and click on “Add”.

If you are using a barcode scanner, but don’t want to attach it to Barcode Buddy (yet), you can also plug it into the device that runs the webbrowser and use it to enter the barcodes in the text field. Each line is parsed as a barcode.

Adding Barcodes Automatically

The preferred way. Most barcode scanners register as a USB keyboard. That way, it is possible to grab the input and send it to Barcode Buddy.

Using a physical barcode scanner

Barcode scanner connected to an Android device

If you use a barcode scanner that is connected to your Android device, you can use the Android App to send all input to Barcode Buddy. Open the app, go to Settings and activate Enable Bluetooth Barcode Scanner. Then return to the main menu. Every time you scan a barcode while being in the app’s main menu, all input is sent to Barcode Buddy. For more info, refer to Using Barcode Buddy app for Android.

Barcode scanner connected to a Linux device

Plug in your barcode scanner to the Linux computer / server you will be using. Run the command evtest as root. You will see a list of devices, select the one that is your barcode scanner and remember the number (e.g.. event6). Scan a barcode. You will now see output in the evtest program. If not, you have selected the wrong source.

Docker

Create a docker container with

docker run -v bbconfig:/config -e ATTACH_BARCODESCANNER=true -p 80:80 -p 443:443 --device /dev/input/eventX f0rc3/barcodebuddy:YOURTAG

where X in --device /dev/input/eventX is the number of your event you selected previously. You might need to change the values for the ports. Scan a barcode - it should be sent directly to Barcode Buddy.

If you would like to bind the barcode scanner by ID (eg. if your input event identifier changes after a reboot), you can use the following command:

docker run -v bbconfig:/config -e ATTACH_BARCODESCANNER=true -p 80:80 -p 443:443 --device /dev/input/by-id/usb-ID-event-kbd:/dev/input/event0 f0rc3/barcodebuddy:YOURTAG

and replace usb-ID-event-kbd with the actual ID.

Bare Metal

Navigate to the example folder in the Barcode Buddy directory. In the file grabInput.sh edit the following values:

  • If your barcode scanner is attached to the same computer / server:
    • SCRIPT_LOCATION: Replace with the location where your index.php file is located

  • If the scanner is attached to a different computer / server:
    • SERVER_ADDRESS: Replace with the URL where your index.php file can be accessed from

    • USE_CURL: Set to “true”

  • If the web server does not run as user www-data (uncommon):
    • WWW_USER: Set to the name of the user

Then run as root

bash grabInput.sh /dev/input/eventX

where X is the number of your event you selected previously. Scan a barcode - it should be sent directly to Barcode Buddy.

To run the script in the background, run

screen -S barcodegrabber -d -m /bin/bash /path/to/the/barcodebuddy/folder/example/grabInput.sh /dev/input/eventX

Using Barcode Buddy app for Android

Download the app here: Google Play Store

Once installed, open Barcode Buddy and navigate to the menu API. There click on the three dots in the top right corner and select Add mobile app. Open your Barcode Buddy app and then scan the displayed QR code. Once the automatic setup is complete, tap on the barcode symbol to start scanning.

Using a 3rd party application / script

If you want to write your own script, there are two ways to send the barcodes to Barcode Buddy: either by calling php index.php yourBarcode or by calling the URL: https://your.bbuddy.url/api/action/scan?apikey=myApiKey&add=123456. Only one barcode can be given with each call. Replace myApiKey with an API key generated in the main menu. For more information about the API visit API.

Barcode Buddy Federation

Overview

Barcode Buddy Federation is an external service, which enables the user to search the Barcode Buddy Federation database for unknown barcodes. By default it is turned off.

It works by sending all barcodes that are associated with a Grocy product to an external server, so that other users can look them up. No personal data will be stored in this process and no data will be used for commercial purposes.

Enabling Federation Lookup

The Federation lookup can be enabled and disabled in the menu “Federation”. There you will find a button to enable / disable this feature.

How to use Federation Lookup

Barcode Lookup

In order to use the lookup feature, Federation must be enabled. If a lookup was unsuccessful with other lookup providers, Barcode Buddy will connect to the Federation database and request the name of the product. If found, the name will be used for the barcode and displayed in the main page under “New Barcodes”. You can also change the lookup order in the settings menu.

Multiple names

Sometimes you might notice that a blue button appears next to the name. This is the case if multiple names were returned by the Federation server. Click on the button to change the name to another one displayed on the selection. Note: By selecting a new name, you actually vote for the name. So if more people select a better fitting name, this name will be the top result the next time.

Reporting Barcode Names

In case you encounter an offensive or malicious name, you can report it by clicking on the flag next to the name in the main menu. This flag is only visible if the name was actually provided by a Federation lookup.