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What is a CueCat? A CueCat is an inexpensive barcode reader that you can connect to your computer. It can be used to enter all kinds of barcode data to save time and reduce data entry errors. For example, you can scan shipping labels to enter package tracking data.

1. Cuecat Driver
2. Cuecat Scanner Driver
3. Cuecat Driver

1. CueJack takes the opportunity to display pages about:CueCat and Digital Convergence - i.e. The controversy over how the normal:CueCat software invaded people's privacy by transmitting info about them to DC every time they scanned something, how DC threatened people for writing Linux drivers for:CueCat, etc.
2. Independent:CueCat™ Driver for Windows 2000 / XP Transform your CueCat™ into a standard barcode scanner Replace the software that is packaged with your:CueCat™ handheld optical barcode scanner by using this keyboard filter driver instead.
3. The:CueCat was a barcode scanner manufactured by vendors of RadioShack Corporation in the early 2000's. The product and associated intellectual property would instantly and directly link product UPC, EAN, ISBN as well as the unique:CRQ Cue codes to their appropriate web sites.
4. The:CueCat was a barcode scanner manufactured by vendors of RadioShack Corporation in the early 2000's. The product and associated intellectual property would instantly and directly link product UPC, EAN, ISBN as well as the unique:CRQ Cue codes to their appropriate web sites.

With Digital Convergence being bankrupt and their web site dead, the CRQ software no longer works, it simply returns the rather cryptic message 'Your computer is not online with the Internet. Please check your Internet connection' whenever a bar code is scanned. This message could more accurately be stated 'The web site www.crq.com cannot be located. Either your Internet connection is inactive or the web site is down. The CueCat software requires access to this web site so demographic data on your scanning habits can be gathered.' But for the purpose of scanning UPC's on CED's and other products, it doesn't matter whether the CRQ software works or not, as third-party software products and hacked scanners are readily available that have no dependence on the software originally included with the CueCat reader.

The CED Title Excel Macro has been available at CEDMagic since 1997, but until now most users have had to manually type in the UPC's due to the expense of getting a scanner for what may be a one time use. The high quality Welch Allyn scanner shown in the photo on the macro page cost about $500 in 1996. A cheap CueCat can be used with the macro to generate a list of CED titles from the scanned bar codes, but there is a catch- the CueCat outputs the bar code in an encrypted form that the macro doesn't understand. Each individual CueCat has a unique serial number as part of the encrypted output, so the existing Excel macro would require extensive modification to take the encryption scheme into account. The best method is to strip the output of everything but the encrypted bar code, then decrypt the bar code and send it to the Excel macro. This is actually pretty simple to do, as the CueCat has attracted the attention of hackers, who have spent the necessary time writing software to do just that. In addition, there are hardware hacks to turn the scanner itself into a simple bar code scanner by cutting traces on the circuit board. Many of the CueCats being sold on eBay are already modified to function this way.

Using the CueCat with the Windows Excel Macro

(1) Obtain a CueCat scanner and attach it to the computer's PS/2 keyboard port (these instructions are for the common PS/2 model rather than the rarer USB model). Do not install the CRQ software on the CD-ROM included with the scanner as it requires an activation code and no longer functions properly anyways. CueCats are most easily found by searching for ('cue cat',cuecat) at the eBay auction site.

(2) Launch Notepad (Start Menu -> Programs -> Accessories -> Notepad) and scan a few CED Bar codes. The scanner output is encrypted and will appear something like the illustration below where each line represents a separate scan.

(3) Download the CatNip program, which is the software to decrypt the CueCat output. This program uses a Virtual Device Driver (VXD), which allows it to operate in any Windows program that accepts keyboard input. This means that a wide range of applications (Notepad, WordPad, Excel, etc.) can be used to capture decrypted bar codes with the CueCat.

(4) Double click the downloaded EXE file to self-extract the CatNip application to a folder named CatNip. Then double click the catnip.exe icon, which will load CatNip and put a small blue cat icon in the System Tray at the lower right corner of the Windows screen. Note that CatNip will be turned off at the next reboot unless you put a shortcut to catnip.exe in the StartUp Folder (Start Menu -> Programs -> StartUp) or double click the catnip.exe icon the next time you want to use it.

(5) Double click the small icon in the System Tray. A CatNip properties window similar to the following will appear.

(6) Set the Output Type to Data and the Output Terminator (the right output box) to <Return> as shown above. These settings cause only the bar code to be output and generate a carriage return after each scan. This is necessary for each bar code to be put in a separate cell with the Excel macro.

(7) Close the CatNip window and scan a few bar codes into Notepad. The output is now decrypted and will appear similar to the illustration below.

(8) Launch the 11-digit CED Title Excel Macro and start scanning CED UPC's into Column A of the macro. The photo below shows a method of scanning a row of CED's by flipping through them. The CueCat will read the UPC's with either a left-to-right or a right-to-left swipe. When finished, run the macro to generate a list of corresponding CED titles.

Using the CueCat with the Macintosh Excel Macro

(1) Obtain a CueCat scanner and attach it to the Macintosh USB port. Some CueCats have a USB connector directly on the unit, but most of them have a round PS/2 mini-DIN6 keyboard connector. In this later case, a PS/2-to-USB adapter is required. RadioShack had available an inexpensive adapter with the catalog number 26-241 when the CueCats were being given away for free, but this particular part will become increasingly difficult to find. Other possible suppliers of PS/2-to-USB adapters include BELKIN and IOGEAR. Do not install the CRQ software on the CD-ROM included with the scanner as it requires an activation code and no longer functions properly anyways. CueCats are most easily found by searching for ('cue cat',cuecat) at the eBay auction site.

(2) Download the MacCat program, which is the software to decrypt the CueCat output. This program captures the CueCat output to the Macintosh clipboard for pasting into the Excel macro. Scanned codes may also be captured to a file.

(3) Unstuff the downloaded MacCat.sit file which yields a folder named MacCat with the MacCat application inside. Double click the MacCat application and a window similar to the following will open.

(4) The three boxes under Decoded Output will be empty, so use the CueCat to scan a CED UPC to confirm the scanner works. A long code should briefly appear in the top CueCat Output box, and then entries similar to those in the above image should appear under Decoded Output.

(5) Set the check boxes in the MacCat window to match the above image. The 'Decode' and 'Clear Output' boxes should be checked, and the third 'Copy to Clipboard' and the 'Append to Clipboard' boxes should also be checked. The third Delimiter pop-up menu should be set to 'CR' or Carriage Return. The first and second 'Copy to Clipboard' and the 'Write to File' boxes should not be checked. These setting capture only the decoded UPC to the clipboard, and each UPC is followed by a carriage return.

(6) Click the 'Clear Clipboard' button in the MacCat window, then scan the UPC's of the CED's that are to be processed by the Excel Macro. The photo further up this page shows a method of scanning a row of CED's by flipping through them. The CueCat will read the UPC's with either a left-to-right or a right-to-left swipe. Each scanned UPC is placed in succession on the Macintosh clipboard.

(7) Launch the 11-digit CED Title Excel Macro and confirm that cell A1 is selected. Select Paste under the Edit menu and the scanned UPC's will appear in column A of the Excel Macro. Run the macro to generate a list of corresponding CED titles.

Frequently Asked Questions about CueCat Scanning

Each CueCat has a unique serial number that becomes associated with your personal demographic data when the device is registered via the CRQ software. This has no influence on CED UPC scanning, as only the CatNip or MacCat programs are required for this, but is something to consider when the scanner is used to launch web sites via UPC or cue scanning. Digital Convergence promises to only use the data gathered generically, but the data could potentially be used to generate a personal profile for each CueCat user. This has caused an uproar among privacy advocates, and hackers have devised means to 'declaw' the scanner by cutting circuit board traces inside the device. This allows the scanner to still launch web sites, but the unique serial number is no longer part of the scanner output.

I take a middle of the road position when it comes to these privacy issues.Digital Convergence plans to give away 10 million of these units at a cost to the company of about $10 each, so they need some means to recoup this investment, which is partially being accomplished by the gathering of demographic data. If this scanner were just a manufactured item offered for sale it would probably sell for at least $50 given the smaller economy of scale and the costs of entering the retail infrastructure. But more important than the money saved is the potential of getting these scanners into the hands of millions of people so the concept of bar code scanning succeeds. I'd like to be able to scan a code on any bar coded item in my home (or at stores with scanning kiosks) and be taken to a web page for that specific product. It would even be possible to set this up with all the CED titles, although I doubt the companies that own the fourteen CED manufacturer's codes will ever allow them to be used for that purpose. Possibly the main obstacle to the success of both the CueCat and the TV convergence cable is the need to be at your computer to scan a code or have the computer close to the TV to capture an audio cue. Digital Convergence is developing wireless CueCats to address the scanning obstacle.

For those concerned with privacy, a simple work around is to get a free email account under an alias (or use the Mailinator service), and use that account for the sole purpose of getting the CRQ activation code. That way your identity is protected and Digital Convergence still gets the generic demographic data.

When the CueCat was first released, it didn't take long for hackers and programmers to figure out ways to either 'neuter' the scanner to convert its encrypted output to a plain bar code or 'declaw' the scanner so the unique serial number in each unit was not transmitted to the CRQ web site every time a bar code was scanned. Digital Convergence initially took a knee jerk reaction to this, having their attorneys send out vague Cease & Desist letters to some of those who made their hacks or programs public on the Internet. It appears they have relented somewhat, as their claim that the scanner is 'on loan' has no legal basis, being that RadioShack just gives the units away without the need to sign anything. The company's present beef seems to be with programs that do the same thing as the CRQ software- go out to the internet and launch a URL. Neither CatNip nor the CEDMagic Excel Macro fall into this category.

Since CRQ is bankrupt, the on-line registration system no longer works, and you don't need to install the CRQ software period, as the CatNip and MacCat programs described above permit the use of the scanner. Even when properly installed, the CRQ software will do nothing but return the message 'Your computer is not online with the Internet. Please check your Internet connection' whenever a bar code is scanned, as the crq.com web site no longer exists.

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Digital Convergence was privately held and never really announced its demise. The final CueNews News Letter from January 30, 2002 merely states their web site will be down for maintenance. A simplified version of the site did reappear in late 2002, but it appears this company ran entirely on venture capital, so it's unlikely they will be giving away any additional free scanners.

This is probably because the CRQ software is running, which prevents scanned codes from reaching these applications. Double click the :C icon in the System Tray, then select Exit from the File menu on the CRQ menu bar.

CatNip only runs until the computer is shut down, and must be re-loaded the next time the computer is turned on. Put a shortcut to CatNip in the StartUp folder to automatically launch it when the computer is turned on, or manually launch it by double clicking the application. The default location is C: -> Program Files -> CatNip.

On Windows PC's the Output Terminator (the right output box) in the CatNip Settings window needs to be set to <RETURN>. Double click the small blue CatNip icon in the System Tray, then select the CatNip settings tab and set the Output Terminator to <RETURN> via the drop down menu. If this happens on the Macintosh when the paste command is executed, make sure 'CR' is the selected option in the third Delimiter pop-up menu.

By default, column A of the macro is formatted as numeric data, meaning the leading zero of all UPC's is dropped. If the column somehow has become formatted as text, the leading zeros will be present and the bar codes won't be recognized. Re-format the column as general numeric data so the leading zero does not appear when bar codes are scanned. If this doesn't correct the problem, make sure you are using the 11-digit UPC version of the Excel macro which includes the scanned checksum digit.

Web Sites of Interest Regarding CueCat Scanning:

The CueCat, styled :CueCat with a leading colon, is a cat-shaped handheld barcode reader that was given away free^[1] to Internet users starting in 2000 by the now-defunct Digital Convergence Corporation. The CueCat was named CUE^[2] for the unique bar code which the device scanned and CAT^[3] as a play on 'Keystroke Automation Technology'^[4] and it enabled a user to open a link to an Internet URL by scanning a barcode — called a 'cue' by Digital Convergence — appearing in an article or catalog or on some other printed matter. In this way, a user could be directed to a web page containing related information without having to enter a URL. The company asserted that the ability of the device to direct users to a specific URL, rather than a domain name, was valuable.^[5] In addition, television broadcasters could use an audio tone in programs or commercials that, if a TV was connected to a computer via an audio cable, acted as a web address shortcut.^[6]

The CueCat connected to computers using the PS/2 keyboard port and USB, and communicated to desktop 'CRQ' software running on Windows 32-bit and Mac OS 9 operating systems. Users of this software were required to register with their ZIP code, gender, and email address. This registration process enabled the device to deliver relevant content to a single or multiple users in a household.

By year-end 2001, Codes could no longer be generated for the device or scanned with the device. However, third-party software can decode the lightweight encryption in the device, allowing it to be used as a general-purpose wand-type barcode reader. The CueCat can read several common barcode types, in addition to the proprietary CUE barcodes promoted by Digital Convergence.

Cuecat Scanner Driver

Introduction[edit]

The CueCat was invented by J. Jovan Philyaw,^[7] who changed his name to Jovan Hutton Pulitzer.^[8][9]Belo Corporation, parent company of the Dallas Morning News and owner of many TV stations, invested US$37.5 million in Digital Convergence, Radio Shack $30 million, Young & Rubicam $28 million and Coca-Cola $10 million.^[10] The total amount invested was $185 million.^[11]

Starting in late 2000 and continuing for over a year, advertisements, special web editions and editorial content containing CueCat barcodes appeared in many U.S. periodicals, including Parade magazine, Forbes magazine and Wired magazine. The Dallas Morning News and other Belo-owned newspapers added the barcodes next to major articles and regular features like stocks and weather. Commercial publications such as AdWeek, BrandWeek and MediaWeek also employed the technology.^[12] The CueCat bar codes also appeared in select Verizon Yellow Pages,^[13] providing advertisers with a link to additional information. For a time, RadioShack included these barcodes in its product catalogs and distributed CueCat devices through its retail chain to customers at no charge. Forbes Magazine mailed out the first 830,000 CueCats as gifts to their subscribers since Forbes was starting to use CRQ (See Our Q Codes) in their magazine.^[14] Wired Magazine mailed over 500,000 of the free devices as gifts to their subscribers. Each subscriber private labeled the CueCat they sent to their mailing list.^[15][16]

In The Wall Street Journal, Walter Mossberg criticized CueCat: 'In order to scan in codes from magazines and newspapers, you have to be reading them in front of your PC. That's unnatural and ridiculous.' Mossberg wrote that the device 'fails miserably. Using it is just unnatural.' He concluded that the CueCat 'isn't worth installing and using, even though it's available free of charge'.^[17]Joel Spolsky, a computer technology reviewer, also criticized the device as 'not solving a problem' and characterized the venture as a 'feeble business idea'.^[18]

The data format^[7] was proprietary, and was scrambled so the barcode data could not be read as plain text. However, the barcode itself is closely related to Code 128, and the scanner was also capable of reading EAN/UPC and other symbologies. Because of the weak obfuscation of the data, meant only to protect the company under DMCA guidelines (like the DVD protection Content Scramble System), the software for decoding the CueCat's output quickly appeared on the Internet, followed by a plethora of unofficial applications.^[19]

Reception[edit]

The CueCat is widely described as a commercial failure. It was listed as one of 'The 25 Worst Tech Products of All Time' by PC World magazine.^[20] The CueCat's critics said the device was ultimately of little use. Joe Salkowski of the Chicago Tribune wrote, 'You have to wonder about a business plan based on the notion that people want to interact with a soda can',^[21] while Debbie Barham of the Evening Standard quipped that the CueCat 'fails to solve a problem which never existed'.^{[22][better source needed]} In December 2009, the popular gadget blog Gizmodo voted the CueCat the #1 worst invention of the '2000s' decade. In 2010, TIME magazine listed it as #5 in a list of 'The 50 worst Inventions',^[23] adding that people didn't accept 'the idea of reading their magazines next to a wired cat-shaped scanner'.

The CueCat device was controversial, initially because of privacy concerns of its collecting of aggregate user data.^[24][25] Each CueCat has a unique serial number, and users suspected that Digital Convergence could compile a database of all barcodes scanned by a given user and connect it to the user's name and address. For this reason, and because the demographic market targeted by Digital Convergence was unusually tech-savvy, numerous websites arose detailing instructions for 'declawing' the CueCat — blocking or encrypting the data it sent to Digital Convergence. Digital Convergence registered the domain 'digitaldemographics.com', giving additional credence to privacy concerns about the use of data.

The company's response to these hacks was to assert that users did not own the devices and had no right to modify or reverse engineer them. Threats of legal action against the hackers swiftly brought on more controversy and criticism.^[26] The company changed the licensing agreement several times, adding explicit restrictions, apparently in response to hacker activity. Hackers argued that the changes did not apply retroactively to devices that had been purchased under older versions of the license, and that the thousands of users who received unsolicited CueCats in the mail had neither agreed to nor were legally bound by the license.

No lawsuit was ever brought against 'hackers', as this tactic was not employed to go after specific users or the hacker community, but to show 'reasonable assertion' that would prevent a corporation from developing integrated software within an operating system or browser which could take over the device and circumvent the CRQ watchdog software and therefore revenue model that Digital Convergence employed.^[27]

Investors in CueCat lost their $185 million. Technology journalist Scott Rosenberg called the CueCat a 'Rube Goldberg contraption', a 'massive flop' and a 'fiasco'.^[10]

Security breach[edit]

In September 2000, security watchdog website Securitywatch.com notified Digital Convergence of a security vulnerability on the Digital Convergence website that exposed private information about CueCat users.^[28] Digital Convergence immediately shut down that part of their website, and their investigation concluded that approximately 140,000 CueCat users who had registered their CueCat were exposed to a breach that revealed their name, email address, age range, gender and zip code. This was not a breach of the main user database itself, but a flat text file used only for reporting purposes that was generated by ColdFusion code that was saved on a publicly available portion of the Digital Convergence web server.

This failure was given a multi-citation Octopus TV 'Failure Award' regarding brands that failed to take off and were hacked.^[29]

Digital Convergence responded to this security breach by sending an email to those affected by the incident claiming that it was correcting this problem and would be offering them a $10 gift certificate to Radio Shack, an investor in Digital Convergence.^[28]

Awards[edit]

In 2001, Computerworld named CueCat as a Laureate in the Media Arts & Entertainment category.^[30]

Availability[edit]

In June 2005, a liquidator offered two million CueCats for sale at $0.30 each (in quantities of 500,000 or more).^[31]

Cuecat Driver

See also[edit]

References[edit]

1. ^'CueCat Mirror List'. www.ultradrive.com.
2. ^http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&s1=6708208.PN.
3. ^http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&d=PALL&s1=D432539.PN.
4. ^'KEYSTROKE AUTOMATION TECHNOLOGY Trademark - Serial Number 75875851 :: Justia Trademarks'. trademarks.justia.com.
5. ^Kaufman, Leslie (October 6, 2000). 'Speaking in Bar Code; Personal Scanners Link Products Directly to Consumers'. The New York Times. Retrieved November 10, 2001.
6. ^Stepanek, Marcia (September 28, 2000). 'The CueCat Is on the Prowl: This gizmo is on the cutting edge of e-marketing. But with each swipe, it tracks your moves through cyberspace'. Bloomberg Businessweek. New York City. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
7. ^ ^ab'Jeffry Jovan Philyaw Inventions, Patents and Patent Applications - Justia Patents Search'. patents.justia.com.
8. ^Wilonsky, Robert (October 25, 2007). 'CueCat Inventor Returns. With What? Not Quite Sure. Something To Do With Interwebs'. Dallas Observer. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
9. ^Celeste, Eric (April 10, 2003). 'Crystal Clear'. Dallas Observer. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
10. ^ ^abRosenberg, Scott (July 11, 2001). 'CueCatastrophe: Next to the company that tried to wire Web users to bar-code scanners, money-burning dot-coms like Webvan don't look quite so bad'. Salon.com. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
11. ^Meyer, Katherine (May 3, 2006). 'The Best of the Worst: CueCat Falls Flat'. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
12. ^Coursey, David. 'CueCat and corporate cluelessness'. ZDNet.
13. ^'Digital:Convergence Nabs Verizon Yellow Pages Deal'. ClickZ. March 28, 2001.
14. ^'CueCat Rollout Proceeds Amid Debate'. www.washingtonpost.com.
15. ^Johnston, Leslie (November 12, 2013). 'Before You Were Born: The Hardware Edition | The Signal'. blogs.loc.gov.
16. ^'Hardware Review: CueCat'. computeme.tripod.com.
17. ^Mossberg, Walter S. (October 12, 2000). 'CueCat Fails to Meet Its Promise Of Being Convenient and Useful'. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved November 10, 2011.
18. ^Spolsky, Joel (September 12, 2000). 'Wasting Money on Cats'. joelonsoftare.com. Retrieved November 12, 2011.
19. ^Kevin Poulsen (2000-09-19). 'Hackers skin CueCat'. Securityfocus.com. Retrieved 2015-02-15.
20. ^The 25 Worst Tech Products of All Time, PC World, May 26, 2006. Retrieved 2011-04-04.
21. ^Salkowski, Joe (2000-09-25). :cuecat Just A Lap Dog For Internet Advertisers.Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 14 November 2017.^{[dead link]}
22. ^Evening Standard, October 16, 2001. Cited at Slashdot forum.
23. ^Dan Fletcher (May 27, 2010). 'CueCat'. Time.
24. ^Colin J.Bennett (2001). 'Cookies, web bugs, webcams and cue cats: Patterns of surveillance on the world wide web'. Ethics and Information Technology. Berlin: Springer Science+Business Media. 3 (3): 195–208. doi:10.1023/A:1012235815384. S2CID32667151.
25. ^'Curiosity killed the CueCat', Network Security, 2000 (11): 2, 2000, doi:10.1016/S1353-4858(00)85003-5
26. ^'Use Of Free Bar-code Scanners Turning Into A Cuecat Fight'. Chicago Tribune. 2000-10-09. Retrieved 2015-02-15.
27. ^Grand, Joe; Mitnick, Kevin D.; Russell, Ryan (January 29, 2004). Hardware Hacking: Have Fun while Voiding your Warranty. Elsevier. ISBN9780080478258 – via Google Books.
28. ^ ^abMachkovech, Sam (2015-10-22). 'Are a million free Google Cardboard sets doomed to repeat CueCat's history?'. Ars Technica. Retrieved 2019-02-14. Major CueCat funder RadioShack later offered a $10 coupon to anybody affected by an eventual private-data leak.
29. ^'The Failure Awards for defunct branding .. #9 :CueCat barcode scanner'. The Drum. October 10, 2017. To add to its woes, the feline company suffered a security leak when ...
30. ^'A Search for New Heroes'. Computerworld Honors. Archived from the original on April 25, 2012. Retrieved November 7, 2011.
31. ^'Two million CueCats at $0.30/each'. Boing Boing. Archived from the original on 2009-02-20.

External links[edit]