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StartGS1128B

Function StartGS1128B : string;

Example​

procedure ScriptEvent(var Value: Variant);
begin
  Value := StartGS1128B + 'Batch-a123';
end;

Usage​

StartGS1128B returns ReportBuilder's Code 128 start-set B character followed by its FNC1 character.

Returns

A two-character string: Char(209) followed by Char(207). In the current Velox Unicode string representation these are U+00D1 (Ñ) and U+00CF (Ï). ReportBuilder treats them as start B and FNC1 controls rather than payload characters.

Behaviour

Set B supports digits, upper- and lower-case letters and punctuation, but not the ASCII control-character range represented by set A. This helper supplies no payload validation, set switching, stop pattern, symbol check character or report configuration.

Errors

A runtime string-allocation failure can propagate.

Additional Technical Info​

StartGS1128B returns the two-character prefix that ReportBuilder uses to begin manually encoded Code 128 set B data and mark the symbol as GS1 data with FNC1.

Implementation

Velox registers the parameterless function directly. Its terminal implementation constructs and concatenates the two Delphi Char values. The ordinals match the constants used by the shipped ReportBuilder manual Code 128 implementation.

Edge cases and quirks

  • The returned characters are ReportBuilder input controls, not raw Code 128 codeword numbers and not a portable GS1 interchange format.
  • Delphi's current Char is 16-bit, whereas Free Pascal's documented Char is 8-bit. Although ordinals 209 and 207 exist in both, conversions through an incompatible code page or normalisation layer can change the string before ReportBuilder sees it.
  • With ReportBuilder automatic encoding enabled, the explicit start control can be removed and a set selected again from the payload. The helper alone does not force set B.
  • No FNC1 separator is inserted after variable-length data, and no check is made that application-identifier content is valid in set B.
  • The historical identifier contains GS1128; the current standards name is GS1-128.

Side effects

The function returns a new managed string only and does not access a report, printer or scanner.

Performance and concurrency

Work and result length are constant. The function has no shared state and is re-entrant.

Related entries

  • StartGS1128A starts set A, including its control-character repertoire.
  • StartGS1128C starts the dense numeric-pair set C.
  • AddGS1128 joins already validated application-identifier text and values.

External references

Created 2026-07-15