UID is Unique Identification and is all encompassing acreoss the DoD enterprise for uniquely identifying entities, including things, real property, organizations, and people.
IUID is Item Unique Identification and represents the DoD efforts for uniquely identifying items.
UII stands for Unique Item Identifier. It is a string of 50 characters or less and must be unambiguous and globally unique. The UII for an item never changes.
The only character allowed in a UII are the capital letters A through Z, the numbers 0 through 9, the dash (-) and the forward (/). The UII is made by concatenating various data associated with the item it will identify; and is encoded into a type of 2D "barcode" (an ECC200 Data Matrix). As example:
Assume the manufacturer is ensuring uniqueness of the UII and has the CAGE Code 0CVA5. Let's also assume the item has a serial number unique within the manufacturer of 674A36458. One way to encode the data matrix:
[)>RS12GSMFR 0CVA5GSSER 674A36458RSEoT
(This is what the data looks like when encoded into a Data Matrix)
This leads to the UII: D0CVA5674A36458
(This is the UII you will get after scanning this Data Matrix)
You may note the characters [)>RS12GSMFR GSSER RSEoT are not part of the UII. They are there because IUID barcodes follow international standards for barcodes (specifically ISO 15434). The RS represents a non-printable character called a Record Separator (ASCII decimal value 30). GS is also a non-printable character; it’s a Group Separator (ASCII decimal value 29). EoT is again a non-printable character, End Of Transmission this time (ASCII value 4).
You may also note the character D is not encoded into the barcode but is part of the UII. It is called the Issuing Agency Code and is there because a Cage Code was used in the UII. The complete rules to build the UII as well as the rules to encode it into a barcode are available in the latest version of the IUID Guide.
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