ShopSavvy, the popular Android/iPhone/Windows 7 Phone app, should be coming soon to a BlackBerry near you. ShopSavvy is a barcode reading application - and much more. Basically, you scan a barcode, and ShopSavvy gives you information about the product. In the Android and iPhone versions, users get access to product reviews and local and online pricing. The few BlackBerry scanner apps don't include local, brick-and-mortar stores.
Alex Muse at Big in Japan has let it slip that they've finally completed the back-end work for their BlackBerry scanner. One truly remarkable feat they've accomplished is live barcode scanning. Currently, BB scanners take a picture and analyze it, looking for a barcode. ShopSavvy will be different. Working with live video coming from the camera, the app will focus and scan the barcode automatically. For folks like me who tire of having to take and re-take pictures of barcodes just to get the scanner to work, live scanning is almost a miracle.
The BlackBerry program libraries for the scanner are complete. All that is lacking is the user interface (what most people would call the actual application) to introduce ShopSavvy to the BlackBerry world. With more than six million users and around 1.3 million scans each day, ShopSavvy has a wide base of users. Word on the street is that Big in Japan is looking for a developer to build the BlackBerry UI. Any takers?