Show HN: WalletWallet – create Apple passes from anything (opens in new tab)

> It won't scan cards with AI - you manually enter the barcode, which I think makes it less prone to error.

This is a very interesting sentence.

I interpret this sentence as saying that manually entering a barcode is less error prone than letting AI do it, that AI would have an unacceptable margin of error (and this is probably an accurate assessment).

But you don't need AI to find or read barcodes. Finding and reading barcodes is a reasonably mature technology that has existed long before AI.

Barcodes exist as a fast, machine readable data transfer format meant to avoid data entry errors by avoiding manual data entry, and yet you've implemented manual entry in order to avoid errors?

Now, if one of the constraints you've put on your implementation is that it work only in the browser and you don't want to have to download a large barcode scanning library to the browser, then it makes sense to implement manual entry. But that has nothing to do with AI.

That being said, there are some barcode reading apps that can be used to prompt for a scan from a web page, and you get the barcode payload back. I've used an app called "bineye" on Android (source on GitHub) that works like this. This helps avoid error prone manual entry and gets the full barcode payload (many barcodes store/encode more information than the human readable text printed next to them).

It'd be awesome if you could add a location to the pass. Apple allows a pass to automatically pop up on the screen based on the device location[1]. If you make it so the user could pick the point on a map for the pass to pop up at it'd be great. That way for example, if you're at the grocery store, your custom pass could be on your lock screen ready for you.

[1] https://developer.apple.com/documentation/walletpasses/pass/...

This is genuinely useful. I have so many loyalty cards that exist only as physical barcodes that stores refuse to look up by phone number.

The privacy concern about sending pass data to the server is valid though. Since .pkpass files need to be cryptographically signed with Apple's certificate, there's no way to generate them purely client-side.

Potential solution: open source the signing code and let users run it locally with their own Apple Developer account ($99/year). Power users would do this, casual users can use your hosted version.

Also works with Google Wallet apparently, which is great for Android users.

Brilliant! Suggestion: most store cards get scanned as a bar code 99% of the time but when calling them they will want you to quote your membership number over the phone. It would be useful to have it printed below the barcode so I can quote it directly from my Apple wallet.

One CSS tip: make sure the input fields have a minimum font-size of 16px. That way iOS won’t zoom-in the page when focussing one.

I solved this issue with Wallet Creator: https://apps.apple.com/app/id1486573384

Didn't know it was this simple to just provide a download for prepared file. Is it open source?

Love the idea, thanks for sharing!

One obvious concern here is data privacy, since the pass details are sent to the server. Any chance it would be possible to run everything in the browser, without sending data back to the server?

This also works for Google Wallet, you could change the messaging around it to indicate that.

As an aside, I find it really sad that, having a de-Googled Anroid phone, it's actually easier for me to download the Apple Wallet .pkpass files

Anything to do with Google Wallet passes just forwards me to a Google login page.

This is great. And it send me down the path of trying to get my library card to work.

Turns out it uses a format called Codebar which is from 1972 and not supported by Apple wallet passes. This tool and most of the other linked ones in this thread did not work. (And also tried to charge me a recurring subscription to use once, but that’s another issue)

I found this one which generates many other barcode formats and generates them as images as a workaround. That seems to work.

https://apps.apple.com/app/id1423106610

This is great! Are you sure you are not violating any ToS for that? I’d hate to see it go

I'm so confused, is HN now littered with nothing but Supported Bots and Crappy AI Generating supposedly a small developer Bots?

Nothing about this app is unique or cool, just one peek at the source code reveals OP or the Bot literally wrote Jack Shit. Everything on the App is powered by Cloudflare's AI tools. In fact, every other App listed on the page is exactly the same.

So with all those thoughts out there, if OP is a real human, then the best we could do is shame them for not having a single drop of creativity and for relying on AI to do all the work. Or are we still pretending this AI is actually useful? Because from the point of an actual engineer with decades of experience and several successful startups that went public, this is seriously concerning, and tells me that the next generation is going to be F'd when they wake up one morning and everything is falling to pieces and they realize that they have no real skills beyond asking a computer to do their work for them.

I've tried it with two cards that just have barcodes (i have no idea which bar code format they are). Your barcode (code 128) doesn't look like the original barcodes on the cards, so unfortunately i can't use the generated wallet cards.

Would be nice to have a preview of the generated card before downloading the correctly generated file.

I wish there were a way to “archive” cards and passes in the Wallet app. I’d be much more likely to pass-ify my life if that were the case.

The Wallet app is just too important and used frequently in time sensitive actions to clutter with cards/passes that I use once every few months. That is, when I’m about to tap to pay, I don’t want to infrequently used cards to clutter my payment experience. Likewise, when I’m about to board a flight, I don’t want random loyalty cards to clutter the interface.

At the same time, I would really like to keep these occasional cards and passes in Wallet, just not on the main screen. It definitely beats hanging onto these physically, especially because they are in fact infrequently used so I would never carry them around.

It should be a similar distinction to Apple’s Home Screen vs App Library for long-term archival.

Code39 would be really useful ;-)

This is such a quick and neat way to get a pass for all the random codes in your wallet.

I've had a long shelved project (>8 years now?) where I was working on a solution to doing this from a mobile device but with loads more customization (including image options for different slots), but the cost effectiveness thanks to the PKPass signing as you noticed, put me off to provide it as a public utility as I was a student then. This gives me motivation to revisit it.

We’ve been using Apple Wallet (and Google Pay) with bar code scanners with some success, but the bar codes sometimes do not scan correctly and we get garbled or completely wrong data maybe 1 in 20-30 scans. Tried various scanner settings/speeds, etc, no dice so far, and the scanner/pos combo was the one recommended by our processing vendor. Both were among the highest dollar models. This looks like a very cool project!

This is very cool thanks. It would be awesome as a PWA so I can have it installed on my home screen/use it offline (edit: it looks like I misunderstood what the website meant by "runs on the browser" - I didn't it has a server dependency. Even so, it's easy to get Claude to generate a manifest and service worker to make it a PWA).

Also, minor UX feedback. Make the barcode type the first form field.

This might be naive, but why not just scan both sides of the card using Apple Notes or a similar app, then present the scan at the store?

Just a question about privacy. It says works entirely in browser, but if you load the page, and then switch off mobile data and put the details in, it seems impossible to create the pass without a data

This is excellent! Wish the Wallet had this ability built in.

This is a good idea, and one I've wanted to build out myself. I think I need source to review before I'm willing to use this one, though.

It does not seem to generate barcode passes, although the option is there. My PassWallet only shows the QR code from a generated .pkpass.

I am curios why Apple requires such rigamorale to add such items to Apple Wallet. Google Wallet has this feature builtin.

I have been looking for something like this for so long! All I wanna do is stop carrying this rec center card around. Perfect.

scanning for barcodes is an easy enough pre-AI computer vision algorithm with OpenCV. AI could "write" that for you!

Pretty useful, just used it to make a "Business Card" that links to my LinkedIn profile.

Source? Can we get a repo please?

I don’t think I fully understand the use case for this. What would you use the card for?

That's very useful, thanks!

One small-ish feature request: could you please add support for EAN-8?

I immediately tried this with my Seattle Orca card, but the barcode is different

Maybe a dumb question: if I'm entering a QR code, which info do i put in?

Thanks for making this, I just used it for gym stuff

This is amazing, thank you! Works with Google Wallet too!

Great job! What are you using on the backend?

How are you signing the pass in my browser?

This is great am I weird for wanting an app?

so not only me! 8K passes generated since the show hn post.