Talk:Card reader

need much bigger article
This article is currently a rather pathetic stub. We have a good article on Memory card and on USB flash drive, but no USB card reader article. Since most card readers are USB, it might as well be this article. The subject is similar to USB flash drive, but even more complex -- so it deserves to be even bigger than that one! 69.87.200.138 22:35, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Bold text WHAT IS CARD READER? HOW IT'S OPERATING? HOW TO USE IT? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.52.92.221 (talk) 05:00, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Should be separate articles
This article describes several items that are known as "card readers", but really have no similarity other than their name. Punched cards are "read" to extract a line of code or data; memory cards are "read" usually by being mounted as disk devices; business cards are "read" by being scanned by an OCR device.

I propose that "card reader" become a dab page leading to articles about these functions, probably under names other than "card reader", or maybe even sections of the articles about the media being read -- punched card readers would seem to fit nicely as a section to an article about punched cards, for example.--NapoliRoma (talk) 17:05, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Mitch Ames (talk) 00:37, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Interconnect with RFID
This article never mentions RFID (as of 2009-12-09=We), and the RFID article barely mentions "card reader". Some explanation should be present in both articles of the relations between the concepts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.171.37.107 (talk) 22:24, 9 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Currently the article lists 3 different types of contactless smart cards: RFID, 'proximity', and Wiegand. I wasn't able to find conclusive info on where those overlap or differ or what other protocols there are or whether it's important enough to have more detail than just lumping it all under 'contactless smart card'. Tangledyarn (talk) 05:43, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

NPOV
I have reviewed and edited the NPOV in the Biometric section and have also Wikified most of it. I am not an expert with this topic, so it would be useful for someone with this knowledge to review my changes. --Soulparadox 09:57, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120116212717/http://www.onlineconveyorparts.com:80/enghelp/OCPBarCodeBasics to http://www.onlineconveyorparts.com/enghelp/OCPBarCodeBasics

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Links in Intro
The introductory paragraph ends with a link to Integrated Circuit under the text "computer chip." Since it's specifically in the context of a card reader, would it be appropriate to link that to Smart Card, since that's much more relevant to the topic of the article than integrated circuits in general? TheGirlWarlockEditor (talk) 20:05, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Reorganization: separate reading mechanisms and uses
Currently the article is a list of reader types, but there's no separation between type of technology and usage. Current sections are a mix of technology type and use case:
 * Smart card readers
 * Memory card readers
 * Access control card reader
 * Toggle Access control card reader subsection
 * Barcode
 * Biometric
 * Magnetic stripe
 * Wiegand card
 * Proximity card
 * Smart card
 * Banking card readers

I'm going to split the article into two major sections with subsections that are easier to source and cross-reference:
 * Mechanisms
 * Optical card readers
 * Text
 * Barcodes
 * Punched cards
 * Mechanical card readers
 * Compressed air/punched cards
 * Magnetic card readers
 * Smart card readers
 * RFID card readers

Tangledyarn (talk) 02:43, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Uses
 * Identification
 * Banking
 * Access control
 * Data storage
 * Data tabulation


 * Ok, rework complete. Still needs quite a few citations and not all of the sections are clear. There's probably a better word than "Mechanisms" for the "different ways readers can read data off of cards" section but I can't think of one. Feedback welcome; I think this is the biggest edit I've made. Tangledyarn (talk) 05:41, 25 January 2024 (UTC)