Contents
Requirements for pre-programmed tags
Tag data MUST consists of AT LEAST 1 numerical parts, competitor number.
- Competitor number MUST NOT be 0 because it is reserved to indicate to software an invalid tag being detected.
Requirements for re-programmable tags
Tag data MUST consists of AT LEAST 2 numerical parts, competition identifier and competitor number.
- Competition identifier MAY be 0 which should tell the software not to separate tags per. competition.
- Competitor number MUST NOT be 0 because it is reserved to indicate to software an invalid tag being detected.
Requirements for tag data serialization
- All data must be in base16 format (0-F) also called hexadecimal format.
- Just as an example, in base10 format (or decimal format) it would be 0-15.
- For instance, competitor number 1 would be
0x01and 73 would be0x49.
Limits of numerical space:
- Competition identifier: 0
0x00- 999 999 9990x3B9AC9FF - Competitor number: 1
0x01- 99 9990x1869F
EPC TDS
GS1's EPC Tag Data Standard (TDS)
https://www.gs1.org/standards/epcrfid-epcis-id-keys/epc-rfid-tds/
EPC UHF Gen2
Gen2 tags has at least following memory areas; EPC, TID, and USER.
For timekeeping purposes, minimum requirements are:
- For pre-programmed tags, TID is used as competitor number, EPC is not used
- For re-programmable tags, EPC is used as competition identifier and competitor number, TID is not used
- Minimum required EPC memory area size is 12 bytes (or 96 bits)
For re-programmable tags
EPC memory map:
- index 0-3, competition identifier, int-32 big-endian
- index 4-7, reserved for future use
- index 8-11, competitor number, int-32 big-endian
Gen2 tags with over 12 bytes EPC memory area MUST NOT utilize it since index 12.
It is also encouraged to set tag's access password to a known one and set write-lock to tag's EPC memory area.
Example: Programming a tag for competition identifier 45 and competitor number 182 should lead to EPC memory data of 0x0000002D00000000000000B6.