CAFETERIA SERVICES MANAGEMENT SOLUTION :

Sultan Qaboos University(SQU) was using old system which issues pre-printed coupons to students depending on their eligibility which, the students exchange for free meals in the canteens. Different coupons were used for breakfast,lunch and dinner.The catering subcontractors used these coupons to present monthly payment claims.

Sultan Qaboos University(SQU) reconciled contractors’ claims against their record of coupons issued and remitted payments to contractors accordingly. Some of the limitations of the current manual system were

• Managing the issue of coupons to students and maintaining the records of the same was time consuming, complex and error prone

• Reconciliation of contractor claims with SQU’s record of coupons issued was also time consuming, complex and error prone.

• The coupons issued to students were being misused

 HOSTEL SECURITY MANAGEMENT SOLUTION :FEMALE RESIDENT SECURITY SYSTEM :

Each female student was required to mark their attendance before retiring at the end of the day. The attendance record was used to ensure the safety and security of female residential students. This was a manual system and had the following limitations:

•  There were be proxy signing.

•  It was difficult to ensure all students were signing in regularly

•  It was difficult to determine those students who were present in the hostel premises from those who were not

SOLUTION: 

After extensive study and analysis, BioEnable has proposed bio-metric solution for this project .The canteen and hostels will be equipped with FRTs and printers (printers in canteens only) that will verify the students’ identity using their fingerprint as the basis for such verification.

For the canteens, Oracle based back end systems will validate the student’s eligibility to each meal session (breakfast,lunch, dinner) and automatically print coupons based on the success of the validation.

The objectives of the proposed solution are:

• Provide SQU with a fast and efficient mechanism to manage and maintain records of meals availed by students.

• Reduce the complexity and time consumed in reconciling contractor claims against meals availed.

• Minimize the potential for misuse of meal coupons in canteens.

• Eliminate proxy signing in the hostels.

• Have current and accurate information on the IN status of female residential students.

 SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE :

As per mandatory requirement of SQU, Five Fingerprint per student was taken taking the total count of fingerprint database to over 2,00,000 fingerprints. To handle this huge database and also to provide matching in fastest possible time frame Bioenable Followed AFIS architecture with database designed on ORACLE. (Please see Fig 1.0)

Fig 1.0 SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE

IMPLEMENTATION DETAILS  :

Initially as a pilot a complete working system in the main student cafeteria was implemented. There were 12 biometric readers located in the entrance areas to the cafeteria, and daily these network attached systems authorize more than 3000 meals. After the pilot the total system was implemented including the following

• Supplied Biometric Fingerprint Recognition Terminals

• Supplied Receipt Printers

• Supplied Hamsters (USB Based Fingerprint Scanners) used for registration

• Customization and Development of SQU specific programs

• Installation of equipment in designated areas