Ron Cemer's Blog | Making the world a better place, one fish at a time.

I've been interested in artificial intelligence and machine learning for quite some time. Some time back, I had experimented with using a Neural Network to attempt to predict whether a stock would go up or down. I had some limited success, but I'm not sure how accurately you can predict something which, without sufficient causal data to describe what is actually happening, generally appears pretty much random.

So, I thought I would apply some machine learning algorithms to something more consistent: the game of Tic-Tac-Toe. I won't describe the game, since anyone over the age of about six has probably played it. What I will describe, is two different approaches I took to teaching a computer to play this game so well as to be unbeatable.

Today's article deals with bar codes. Specifically, it deals with generating and decoding UPC-A and Code 3 of 9 bar codes in Java. A Java library and sample code are provided to demonstrate the functionality.

How it Works

This bar code engine is implemented as a Java library, along with a few demo applications which show the library in action.

Several years back, I was working on an imaging project in Java which was going to require some Optical Character Recognition (OCR) functionality. After an exhaustive search, I could find nothing to fit the bill. My requirements were:

• Must be written in Java
• Must be freely redistributable, with or without source code
• Must not be proprietary
• Must be able to recognize the fonts of various printers, even if that means that it has to be trained for each new font
• Must be reasonably fast

Hello! My name is Ron. I'm a sinner saved by grace, follower of Christ, amateur theologian, husband, father, guitarist, singer-songwriter, worship leader, professional software developer, electronics engineer, fisherman, boat operator, real estate investor, handyman, and lover of life.

I've been developing the content on this site for several years now. I'll be continuing to add content and resources as time permits.

Stay awhile, and have a look around. I trust you will be blessed by what you see here.

Be sure to bookmark this site and come back often, as I'll be continuing to add stuff that you're sure to find interesting.

In Christ,
Ron

As a Christian, I occasionally run into people who claim that they don’t believe in God. In this article, I’ll share with you some of their reasonings, and provide counter-arguments. Also, I’ll delve into some of the underlying motivations these people have for claiming to believe that there is no God.

For those of you who are looking for cheap car insurance, we recently discovered a decent car insurance company: Safeco.

For many years, we’ve been a faithful Progressive customer, and have enjoyed their great service and decent prices. However, my wife and I were able to save about 20% by going with an insurance carrier that was sold through the same agent as our homeowner’s insurance company. In this case, it was Safeco.

I’ve been writing software professionally since 1987. I’ve seen more technologies come and go than most people would care to shake a stick at.

Over the years, I’ve developed a rather sizeable library of code written in various languages. Some of my stuff is experimental in nature, but a lot of it is in use in real-world, mission-critical applications that are used by many people every day.