I have been searching and searching for a solution to this...and I can't seem to find a solution!?!?! I have a serial barcode reader. I thought it would be as easy as plugging it into one of the COM ports on my linux box, and it would all fall into place (all my other serial devices worked this way). When I scan something, nothing seems to make it back to the terminal. More to the point, nothing is displayed on the screen. When I use a USB reader, or a keyboard wedge, the scanned barcodes make it back to the terminal just fine...just not when connected serially.

Any ideas/suggestions? I need help bigtime on this!

Except for basically mice, MODEMs and printers there are no protocol standards or anything like plug and play for serial port devices. Wedges and USB devices are typically recognized as keyboards so no additional drivers are required. The only linux driver for serial port bar code readers I am aware of is linbar. However it is no longer being supported so it may or may not work with your device as is.
http://www.roryt.gr/linbar/

Half a century ago when I encountered this problem I bought a number of serial -> wedge converters. That is the name of it, dunno if they still exist and that is all I can remember as it is quite some time ago.
For most programs wedging is easier to integrate than serial unless you program is prepared for serial.

jlinkels