Sending data to GSM/SIM

[Tyarf]

Hello all
I am the co-owner of a gym and recently we have decided to switch over to membership cards, which members need to swipe at the door in order to gain access to the gym, as we've had a lot of people coming in and not paying/forgetting to pay the day fee. We already have the hardware sorted for the opening of the door (so that when they swipe, if the card info is valid they can enter) but as well as this, the other co-owner has requested that he receives a text message containing just the membership number (contained on the card - we only have about 50 members and only 1/2 of those are regular, so he is able to identify them by their memb. number). I don't care about this so I don't need it sending to me too, just his number.

If someone could give me some starting tips as to how to go about this - hardware,code languages, etc. I have decent amount of knowledge of computer programming, however coding isn't my speciality.

Many thanks.

EDIT: Forgot to add, I need this as miniature as it comes, we only have a small area to work with on the door for this bit(approx 5cmx5cm)

 

[TiagoRibeiro]

Hi,
What you need is to send a message to their paying customers, so they can enter the gym without any problems? Are you thinking of someone to do the checking of codes or a more autonomous way for your customers to enter the gym?
If you want to do just sending the codes to the phone of the person, is simple.
A GSM module connected to your computer can solve your problem. You only need to develop a software to send the codes to automatically form your customers and you can add or remove the paying / non-paying customers. You can use the liguagem easier for you, such as Pascal, C / C + +, JAVA.
or you can pay someone to develop for you.
Hope this help and guide you.;-)

 

[horace1]

how do you receive the card data from the swipe card reader? e.g. RS232 interface, USB interface, etc?
if you use a modem which sends a text message it will cost you every time a message is sent. Could you buffer the numbers and send them once a hour or when the buffer is full?
An alternative is to use WiFi if the gym already has it installed - then does not cost you anything

 

[Tyarf]

how do you receive the card data from the swipe card reader? e.g. RS232 interface, USB interface, etc?
if you use a modem which sends a text message it will cost you every time a message is sent. Could you buffer the numbers and send them once a hour or when the buffer is full?
An alternative is to use WiFi if the gym already has it installed - then does not cost you anything

It's a USB card swiper. I've found a nice deal for a SIM card with unlimited texts, so we were planning on taking out a contract for that. My colleague has said that he wants them to be sent instantly so he can call up the front desk if he needs to talk to them (and seeing as the SIM has unlimited texts, it's not a problem). The gym does have wifi, how would we go about using WiFi to send it over SMS?

 

[horace1]

if your collegue wants information to his modile phone using a modem with your low cost SIM card sounds the way to go (I would use WiFi for logging information to UDP or TCP servers with reports on a laptop or similar).
you say the swipe card reader has a USB interface- do you have the specification of the data format it transmits to a host system?
if so you could use any microcontroller with a USB host facility and any suitable modem.
For example, we are about to get a PCB with a PIC24FJ64GB004, a Seria wireless AirPrime HL6528x modem etc with a USB interface for a data logging application.

 

[Tyarf]

if your collegue wants information to his modile phone using a modem with your low cost SIM card sounds the way to go (I would use WiFi for logging information to UDP or TCP servers with reports on a laptop or similar).
you say the swipe card reader has a USB interface- do you have the specification of the data format it transmits to a host system?
if so you could use any microcontroller with a USB host facility and any suitable modem.
For example, we are about to get a PCB with a PIC24FJ64GB004, a Seria wireless AirPrime HL6528x modem etc with a USB interface for a data logging application.

I'm afraid I'm not sure of all the technicalities, but this is the exact model we have: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Accuartus-.../B000IZX4E6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1406318490

 

[horace1]

does it plug into a PC and there is some software on the PC which validates the cards and then operates the door lock?
if so could you attach a modem to the PC to send an SMS text message?

 

[Tyarf]

does it plug into a PC and there is some software on the PC which validates the cards and then operates the door lock?
if so could you attach a modem to the PC to send an SMS text message?

No, the validation is on a separate system. We hired someone to design that, so it's a bit difficult to go into details, but essentially the validation system can be ignored as if it's not there (for the purpose of this thread). We can't connect it to a PC (even a laptop) because of it's location, so we instead power the validation hardware using a battery which we recharge every week, and plan to do the same for this SMS system.

 

[horace1]

I assume the USB from the card reader plugs into the validaation system. Has the validation system any output (e.g. RS232) reporting the card just read? could the SMS modem be added to the validation system?

 

[Tyarf]

I assume the USB from the card reader plugs into the validaation system. Has the validation system any output (e.g. RS232) reporting the card just read? could the SMS modem be added to the validation system?

It's a lot more complicated than that, so as I said above, just imagine that the validation system does not exist, and the USB cable is just hanging there not plugged into anything. Then what would we do?

 

[horace1]

if you know the USB protocol you can plug it into a microcontroller with USB host facilities
initially, to save building your own PCB use a starter kit such as
https://www.microchip.com/Developmenttools/ProductDetails.aspx?PartNO=DM320003-2