cordova-plugin-idscan

A Cordova plugin for the camera scanner and ID parser SDK's from IDScan.net. Use it to scan drivers licenses and other IDs with the device camera, and parse out the data. Android and iOS are supported.

A valid license key is required for both SDKs from IDScan.net for the plugin to work. You only need keys for the platform you are using.

To install the plugin directly from command line:

cordova plugin add https://github.com/IDScanNet/cordova-plugin-idscan

To clone the GitHub repository locally to modify the code and install from there. The plugin is exposed to your Cordova javascript code as the IDScanner object. Simply call the scan() function as follows:

    function successCallback(result) {
      console.log("Successfully scanned ID for " + result.fullName);
      console.log("Birth date: " + result.birthdate);
    }

    function errorCallback(errorMsg) {
      console.log(errorMsg);
    }

    IDScanner.scan(successCallback, errorCallback, cameraKey, parserKey);

For all fields available on the result object returned from the IDScanner, refer to DriverLicenseParser.h in the iOS SDK (e.g. firstName, lastName, address1, address2, city, postalCode, licenseNumber, expirationDate, issueDate, etc.)

If you need to update the SDK files from IDScan.net, you can just drop new ones in the SDK folders of the iOS and Android source.

iOS Quirks

Since iOS 10 it is mandatory to provide a usage description in the info.plist if trying to access privacy-sensitive data. When the system prompts the user to allow access, this usage description string will be displayed as part of the permission dialog box, but if you didn't provide the usage description, the app will crash before showing the dialog. Also, Apple will reject apps that access private data but don't provide a usage description.

This plugin requires the following usage descriptions:

  • NSCameraUsageDescription specifies the reason for your app to access the device's camera.
  • NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription specifies the reason for your app to access the user's photo library.
  • NSLocationWhenInUseUsageDescription specifies the reason for your app to access the user's location information while your app is in use. (Set it if you have CameraUsesGeolocation preference set to true)
  • NSPhotoLibraryAddUsageDescription specifies the reason for your app to get write-only access to the user's photo library

To add these entries into the info.plist, you can use the edit-config tag in the config.xml like this:

<edit-config target="NSCameraUsageDescription" file="*-Info.plist" mode="merge">
    <string>need camera access to take pictures</string>
</edit-config>

<edit-config target="NSPhotoLibraryUsageDescription" file="*-Info.plist" mode="merge">
    <string>need photo library access to get pictures from there</string>
</edit-config>