OK, a side project with my InventoryDifferent inventory management system is to have a set of up-to-date, accurate templates for when I get a new device. Even better is to be able to quickly scan the serial number barcode on the device, and the app can look up the device model information and pre-populate much of the information.
The problem is that there is some information on the serial number format and how to match config codes from the serials to models. I've pulled as much information as I could from various repos on GitHub, but it seems like there are still plenty of gaps. I know EveryMac has a serial number lookup, but I want the information to be publicly accessible without having to do human verification every time, or to pay for access.
So I wrote a little app that grabs eBay listings for all my templates and then tries to find images with the serial number (either a barcode or a screenshot with it). It's not perfect, but id did allow me to quickly run through thousands of eBay listings. Of those, it actually brought about 2400 candidates to me. Of those, about 1k were not for the device it was trying to search for. ~600 didn't have a legible serial number in the images. And about 600 I was able to extract serial numbers from. Form those, I've been able to map several hundred new config codes to devices.
However, I still continually find serial numbers that don't match to devices. So I'm asking the community for help. You can access the device templates at:
https://templates.inventorydifferent.com/
And if you have some devices and want to help me improve it and hopefully create a better system for mapping serial numbers to devices. My plan is to take the config code mappings to a public GitHub repo so others can reference and update if they have more data.
The easiest way is to use a mobile phone, hit the website and tap the barcode scanner button by the search bar, point your camera are the barcode for the serial number. Hopefully you'll get a hit and see the device matches. If not, I'd love it if you would select the device it matches and submit it for me to add.
Note that my templates only include 68k and PowerPC devices. There are a few intel devices in there, but in general, I wanted to start with the older stuff. I will likely try to spend some time building out the newer intel stuff.
Thanks all for any help. I'm hoping this can help the community have a free, transparent, and maintained set of specs for devices, and an easy way to look them up by the serial number!
The problem is that there is some information on the serial number format and how to match config codes from the serials to models. I've pulled as much information as I could from various repos on GitHub, but it seems like there are still plenty of gaps. I know EveryMac has a serial number lookup, but I want the information to be publicly accessible without having to do human verification every time, or to pay for access.
So I wrote a little app that grabs eBay listings for all my templates and then tries to find images with the serial number (either a barcode or a screenshot with it). It's not perfect, but id did allow me to quickly run through thousands of eBay listings. Of those, it actually brought about 2400 candidates to me. Of those, about 1k were not for the device it was trying to search for. ~600 didn't have a legible serial number in the images. And about 600 I was able to extract serial numbers from. Form those, I've been able to map several hundred new config codes to devices.
However, I still continually find serial numbers that don't match to devices. So I'm asking the community for help. You can access the device templates at:
https://templates.inventorydifferent.com/
And if you have some devices and want to help me improve it and hopefully create a better system for mapping serial numbers to devices. My plan is to take the config code mappings to a public GitHub repo so others can reference and update if they have more data.
The easiest way is to use a mobile phone, hit the website and tap the barcode scanner button by the search bar, point your camera are the barcode for the serial number. Hopefully you'll get a hit and see the device matches. If not, I'd love it if you would select the device it matches and submit it for me to add.
Note that my templates only include 68k and PowerPC devices. There are a few intel devices in there, but in general, I wanted to start with the older stuff. I will likely try to spend some time building out the newer intel stuff.
Thanks all for any help. I'm hoping this can help the community have a free, transparent, and maintained set of specs for devices, and an easy way to look them up by the serial number!
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