平成25年度 春期 ITパスポート試験 問18

※ Our check while writing this explanation could not fully confirm the published answer; scoring follows IPA's official key.

• ×Incorrectア

  It is wrong in stating that the item code, too, is obtained by applying to a public institution. The item code is a number for distinguishing a company's own products, and applying to the registration body every time a new product is released would make operations unworkable. The manufacturer itself assigns it within the range of the manufacturer code it has been granted.

• ○イ

  正解 The correct answer is イ. A JAN code is the common product code used in Japan (internationally it corresponds to GS1's EAN). The standard 13-digit type consists of a manufacturer code (GS1 company prefix) + an item code + a 1-digit check digit. Of these, the manufacturer code is the part that identifies a company uniquely worldwide, so a company cannot decide it on its own. In Japan it must be applied and registered for with a public registration body, the Distribution Systems Research Institute (GS1 Japan), which then grants the code to the company for its use. The item code, on the other hand, is the part under the granted manufacturer code that expresses which product of that company it is, so the company (the manufacturer) assigns it freely to each of its own products. In short, the combination is “upper part = obtained by application, lower part = assigned in-house,” so イ — the manufacturer code is obtained by applying to a public institution and the item code is assigned by the manufacturer — is appropriate.

• ×Incorrectウ

  The roles of the manufacturer code and the item code are reversed. It is precisely the manufacturer code, which identifies a company uniquely, that must be granted by a public institution; if a manufacturer assigned it at will, it would overlap with another company's code and the uniqueness of the code would break down.

• ×Incorrectエ

  It is wrong in stating that both are assigned by the manufacturer. If each company could decide the manufacturer code freely, the same number would arise across different companies, and the premise that a JAN code identifies a product uniquely worldwide would no longer hold. The manufacturer code must always be obtained by applying to the registration body.