rigidigital
Senior Member
its been ages since i purchased picaxe products. I hsve used a few stores. im having brain freeze, can you suggest a store or two for me ? thanks
what are a couple of best stores to order in australia
- Thread starter rigidigital
- Start date
Indeed Wiltronics (=>www.wiltronics.com.au/search.php?search=picaxe ),
but also Altronics (=>www.altronics.com.au/index.asp?search=picaxe&area=srch&Submit=SEARCH )
Microzed-the orginal Australian PICAXE distributor- suddenly ceased trading mid 2012...
but also Altronics (=>www.altronics.com.au/index.asp?search=picaxe&area=srch&Submit=SEARCH )
Microzed-the orginal Australian PICAXE distributor- suddenly ceased trading mid 2012...
rigidigital
Senior Member
I agree
I have some other mocrocontrollers from Paralax. I also have some smart cards and a smart card reader/holder. In the propellpr obex there was the needed code to read and write. Its seemng reallt hard ro find sincethey played around with the OBEX.
I am wondering if anyonehere can find a way to read and write smart cards using the picaxe? I want to make an employee time sheet for each month , if they can be encouraged to use the cards. The hours they are handing in to the cattle and crop station are far from honest. For example, in their work hours book they claim to still have been at work at 9pm when they have been seen on the road into town at 5pm
I am going to order from the UKc
I have some other mocrocontrollers from Paralax. I also have some smart cards and a smart card reader/holder. In the propellpr obex there was the needed code to read and write. Its seemng reallt hard ro find sincethey played around with the OBEX.
I am wondering if anyonehere can find a way to read and write smart cards using the picaxe? I want to make an employee time sheet for each month , if they can be encouraged to use the cards. The hours they are handing in to the cattle and crop station are far from honest. For example, in their work hours book they claim to still have been at work at 9pm when they have been seen on the road into town at 5pm
rigidigital
Senior Member
od stick with the propeller but the language SPIN is WeIrD
Mate -you perhaps need to first consider why "glide time" is being so exploited! What other management/staff issues & morale influences are present? The very nature of such (isolated?) station work may well be highly relevant too. Do staff put in REAL hard yards during peak season when the workload is higher ?
(For those ignorant of the Australian outbacks,"the road into town" may involve hours of rough tracks & kangeroo dodging before the highway is encountered. After that it's just a mere 200 km to the shops.)
Aside from Picaxe/smart card solutions, check such state of the art time clocks as this.
rigidigital
Senior Member
not really
I can understand your response as i gave little detail. The country town is only 30 min drive from the property. I will do this smart card solution , for fun. It probly wont be used but i will enjoy trying to do it. I probably will have to use spin.
thanks for your other parts of the response and taking the time to respond.
I can understand your response as i gave little detail. The country town is only 30 min drive from the property. I will do this smart card solution , for fun. It probly wont be used but i will enjoy trying to do it. I probably will have to use spin.
thanks for your other parts of the response and taking the time to respond.
westaust55
Moderator
If you are after parts other than PICAXE the. For general electronics you can try:
Altronics
Jaycar
Oztronics
Littlebird Electronics
Futurlec (warehouse in Thailand)
Robot Electronics.
Folks can give better information if we know more specifically what you are seeking -even at a slightly general level.
Altronics
Jaycar
Oztronics
Littlebird Electronics
Futurlec (warehouse in Thailand)
Robot Electronics.
Folks can give better information if we know more specifically what you are seeking -even at a slightly general level.
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rigidigital
Senior Member
west,,, Jaycar, Futurelec and littlebird have all been great in the past. I have also used wiltronics in the past, the paradox if thats the right word is i find picaxe easy to program (relativly) but the boards and certain other parts are quite expensive wheras the prop from parallax is so damned cheap. its been a year since i did anything, so i forget spin quickly but ill persevere and it should come back to me. Both forums are excellent. Sometimes i wish i had just stuck with the picaxe. I had a go at the arduino but my c is atrocious and i didnt have the patience. Im still learning, a couple of years ago i bought kits from jaycar , pretending to by them for my son or nephews, the salesman asked me "are these for you " , i admitted yes they were He thought that was great and told me he wished more adults were interested in the field
He thought that was great and told me he wished more adults were interested in the field 
Should be possible but the first question is which sort of smart card; simple EEPROM cards or those which have a MCU plus EEPROM ?
The first are pretty much an I2C interface and second a serial interface. You can find RS232 card readers which should make the actual interfacing even easier. The hard part seems to be in the command protocol which I am not familiar with.
As you appear to be an on farm person with cattle, then a different solution might be to build a RFID tag reader, and give each employee a ear tag button to scan.
Is not that hard of a project to build, and a friend and myself designed one for his small farm requirements, although it uses a Pic F88 and not a picaxe, but the pic program is written and all tag reads are stored to eeprom in a I2C chip.
It do not include a time stamp, as that was not required for in yard use, although it can be selected to output serial data for the tag number when its read in ASCCI format, so it would be easy to use a picaxe to read in the tag number via serial and then read a RTC to store the tag number and a time stamp of when it was scanned.
Perhaps not what you were intending, but a quirky solution of logging staff movements, and also perhaps an interesting project for you to learn how RFID animal tag readers work, and how to build one.
Im not suggesting the employee needs to wear the ear tag, as that might cause a few problems,
but simply wind his window down and wave the tag past the scanner on entry and exit, as it only has a read range of 200 - 300 mmwestaust55
Moderator
Devils advocate: Then with simple systems what stops Tom and Dick giving their tags to Harry and leaving early then Harry swipes all three at a later time. Do you then add a camera to get vehicle ID as each tag is swiped?
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Good point Westy, but then the humble time card that has been used for decades in industry has also been subject to the same abuse, but history shows human nature dont always work the way of abuse, when one thinks another is watching.
Then Tom and Dick best hope Harry is on time the following day for work, or all 3 will pay the price of being late to work.
There is also the time stamp to give a indication of behaviour practices, like 3 tag scans in less than a minute would cause a alarm.
Then Tom and Dick best hope Harry is on time the following day for work, or all 3 will pay the price of being late to work.
There is also the time stamp to give a indication of behaviour practices, like 3 tag scans in less than a minute would cause a alarm.
inglewoodpete
Senior Member
Oh well. It looks like we're back to the (permanently attached) RFID ear tags after all!
IWP,
I hope that is not a assumption from my comments, as it was just a idea and not a solve all method.
Then again if each employee had a ear tag then the problem would be solved, but have you seen the actual size of a animal RFID ear tag??? as i think most employees would fill in the correct time if it meant needing a ear tag permanently installed, as its almost like having a carpet square attached to your ear.
I hope that is not a assumption from my comments, as it was just a idea and not a solve all method.
Then again if each employee had a ear tag then the problem would be solved, but have you seen the actual size of a animal RFID ear tag??? as i think most employees would fill in the correct time if it meant needing a ear tag permanently installed, as its almost like having a carpet square attached to your ear.