CODE 39 — Code 39 is probably the most widely used symbology after the U.P. C . / E A N code. It meets the needs for many applications in a large variety of industries, including the Department of Defense (DoD), General Services Administration (GSA), the Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG), and the Health Industry Business Communication Council (HIBC). Code 39 encodes alphanumeric data in any length, including the full ASCII characters. It will also encode decimal numbers, the upper-case alphabet, and some special symbols. It works with the greatest selection of printers and scanners. This symbol, created by Intermec Technologies in 1975, uses nine elements: five bars and four spaces. Of these nine elements, two of the bars and one of the spaces are wider than the rest. Wide elements represent binary ones (1), and narrow elements represent binary zeros (0).