Dynamically generating a QR code using PHP

There are a number of open source libraries available online which can be used to generate a Quick Response(QR) Code. A good open source library for QR code generation in PHP is available in sourceforge. It just needs to be downloaded and copied in the project folder. This includes a module named “phpqrcode” in which there is a file named “qrlib.php”. This file must be included in the code to use a function named ‘png()’, which is inside QRcode class. png() function outputs directly a QR code in the browser when we pass some text as a parameter, but we can also create a file and store it.

Syntax:

QRcode::png($text, $file, $ecc, $pixel_Size, $frame_Size);

Parameters: This function accepts five parameters as mentioned above and described below:

• $text: This parameter gives the message which needs to be in QR code. It is mandatory parameter.
• $file: It specifies the place to save the generated QR.
• $ecc: This parameter specifies the error correction capability of QR. It has 4 levels L, M, Q and H.
• $pixel_Size: This specifies the pixel size of QR.
• $frame_Size: This specifies the size of Qr. It is from level 1-10.

Example 1: PHP program to generate QR Code.

<?php

// Include the qrlib file
include 'phpqrcode/qrlib.php';

// $text variable has data for QR
$text = "GEEKS FOR GEEKS";

// QR Code generation using png()
// When this function has only the
// text parameter it directly
// outputs QR in the browser
QRcode::png($text);
?>

Output:

Note: This output is directly generated in the browser. This code will not run on an online IDE because it can’t include ‘phpqrcode’ module.

Example 2: PHP program to generate QR Code and create file.

<?php
// Include the qrlib file
include 'phpqrcode/qrlib.php';
$text = "GEEKS FOR GEEKS";

// $path variable store the location where to
// store image and $file creates directory name
// of the QR code file by using 'uniqid'
// uniqid creates unique id based on microtime
$path = 'images/';
$file = $path.uniqid().".png";

// $ecc stores error correction capability('L')
$ecc = 'L';
$pixel_Size = 10;
$frame_Size = 10;

// Generates QR Code and Stores it in directory given
QRcode::png($text, $file, $ecc, $pixel_Size, $frame_size);

// Displaying the stored QR code from directory
echo "<center><img src='".$file."'></center>";
?>

Output:

Note: The output of both examples are different. In the first example, the output will display in default frame and pixel size which is generated directly on browser whereas the output of the second example is a ‘png’ file with pixel and frame size as 10 stored in a directory.