Membership tracking and access control

[Damian Axford]

In prep for the upcoming incorporation...  and in readiness for a new location.  We had a quick chat last night about building a combined membership tracking/mgmt and access control system.  There are a bunch of existing projects along these lines, but for now, we're going to have a go at building one.

Jess is working on the server (database, etc), I'm going to make a start on the client side (i.e. the door or machine control bit).

Rough architecture:

• Server:
• Simple relational database
• Web service providing admin interface and simple api for endpoints
• Probably in Perl, maybe Python
• Client:
• ESP8266 connected thing, that can control electric door strikes and/or power to machine tools
• Might be Arduino+ESP8266, or NodeMCU
• Has one, or more NFC/RFID reader modules for diff card types
• Talks to server over simple http api

Jess has some photos of our flipchart notes - hopefully can post them here (nudge nudge).

Potential API:

• get /openSesame?thingID=123&accessToken=456
• Server looks up thingID (which represents the unique door or machine)
• and checks to see if card/tag accessToken (456) matches a known person and if they have access to this thing 
• Returns 1 for yes, 0 for no
• Client opens door (or turns on machine) if 1