node.js USB (hid) Barcode Scanner read Buffer - node.js

Question

i'm using node.js, to read data from a Barcode Scanner. So that is my code:
var HID = require('node-hid');
var usb = require('usb');
// Honeywell Scanner
var vid = 0xc2e;
var pid = 0xbe1;
var d = new HID.HID(vid, pid);
d.on("data", function (data) {
console.log(data);
});
d.on("error", function (error) {
console.log(error);
d.close();
});
My Problem is, that i get a Buffer that looks like < Buffer 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 >. After scanning a barcode (for example a barcode with the id 12) the console returns something like that
<Buffer 00 00 53 00 00 00 00 00>
<Buffer 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00>
<Buffer 00 00 53 00 00 00 00 00>
<Buffer 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00>
<Buffer 00 00 1e 00 00 00 00 00>
<Buffer 00 00 1f 00 00 00 00 00>
How can i convert this Buffer output into a readable string? In that case it would be a 12.
Thanks for your help!

Answer 1

I think what you want to do is to decode your data buffer.
To decode a buffer, you simply use the built-in .toString() method, passing in the character encoding to decode to:
data.toString('hex'); //<-- Decodes to hexadecimal
data.toString('base64'); //<-- Decodes to base64
If you don't pass anything to toString, utf8 will be the default.
EDIT
If you'd like to know which character encodings are currently supported by Node (other than hex, base64 and utf8), visit the official docs.