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Kiosk mode with support for Barcode, RFID, Web NFC

Attendance time-tracking in an environment, where the user has no access to Kimai (e.g. in a warehouse), by using a barcode or RFID scanner to start and stop timesheets.

Kevin Papst
Offered by
Kevin Papst

A Kimai plugin, which allows using barcodes for punch-in and punch-out time tracking with Kimai. You can use it with a barcode scanner, with a web-camera, with a RFID reader or an NFC reader.

It also supports a “freestyle” mode, which allows to enter any free configurable code (up to 120 characters), so you can also use other devices for starting/stopping:

  • an electronic USB number-pad
  • an RFID scanner that acts as keyboard
  • an Android device with Web NFC support (only Chrome browser)

This bundle is the solution for you, if you want to use Kimai in a kiosk mode, where users register their attendance time through punch-in (coming) and punch-out (leaving) mode.

It could be as simple as:

  • Hand out NFC or RFID tokens to your employees
  • Mount a tablet to the wall in your entrance room
  • Let your users check-in & check-out when entering the building by scanning their tokens

You can test it in the “Plugins” demo.

Features

  • Start/Stop work with
    • Barcode scanner (via device camera, only works via HTTPS)
    • Barcode scanner (via USB or Bluetooth)
    • RFID scanner (via USB or Bluetooth)
    • Web NFC (see docs)
  • Upon starting/stopping a record via this plugin, the user will see a short overview screen with the entries of the current week (including some statistics)
  • New user profile screen for the “codes”
    • Display all codes for user
    • Generate a random code (automatically done if none is existing yet for the active code-type)
    • Re-use existing code for user by entering (or scanning) it manually
  • User specific settings to configured allowed start and end working time (user can only clock in between these times)
  • Supports the following 1D barcodes:
    • Code 128
    • Code 39
    • UPC-A (scanner needs to transmit check digit)
    • Code 2 of 5
    • Code 2 of 5 interleaved
    • Codabar (scanner needs to transmit start & stop digits)
  • Optional: show active / inactive users in login screen
  • Many CSS classes to customize the look with Custom CSS

You need to configure a non-global activity for starting the record via this plugin. This will be used for every recorded timesheet that is created using the kiosk mode.

Hardware

Self-built setups

This is NOT a hardware recommendation, but more an idea for possible use-cases.

I tried the linked products and even though all scanner are rather cheap, they work without problems.

Above are affiliate links for Amazon (Germany) where I bought them myself.

Meeting-Room Tablet with NFC

This proposal contains a tablet which can be wall- and VESA mounted, has WLAN and only needs a tiny AC adapter. The NFC reader is on the front, so users can easily scan their tokens.

  • Meeting room tablet: AllNet DE AllNet AT (this only works if you switch to the AT Shop through the dropdown in the header of the Shop)

You need a Kiosk application, which makes sure that users always see the login screen:

And you need a bunch of NFC tokens:

Licenses

The following libraries are used when using barcodes with the Kiosk mode:

  • Barcode scanning: https://github.com/ericblade/quagga2 (Version: 0.0.18, License: MIT)
  • Barcode generation: https://github.com/metafloor/bwip-js (Version: 2.0.6, License: MIT)

Installation

Copy files

Extract the ZIP file and upload the included directory and all files to your Kimai installation to the new directory: 

var/plugins/KioskBundle/

The file structure needs to look like this afterwards:

var/plugins/
├── KioskBundle
│   ├── KioskBundle.php
|   └ ... more files and directories follow here ...

Clear cache

After uploading the files, Kimai needs to know about the new plugin. It will be found once the cache was re-built. Call these commands from the Kimai directory:

How to reload Kimai cache

bin/console kimai:reload --env=prod

It is not advised, but in case the above command fails you could try:

rm -r var/cache/prod/*

You might have to set file permissions afterwards:

Adjust file permission

You have to allow PHP (your webserver process) to write to var/ and it subdirectories.

Here is an example for Debian/Ubuntu, to be executed inside the Kimai directory:

chown -R :www-data .
chmod -R g+r .
chmod -R g+rw var/

You might not need these commands in a shared-hosting environment. And you probably need to prefix them with sudo and/or the group might be called different from www-data.

Create database

Run the following command:

bin/console kimai:bundle:kiosk:install

This will create the required database tables and update them to the latest version.

Install assets

The following command will install the required assets (images, javascripts, styles):

bin/console assets:install

Updates

Updating the plugin works exactly like the installation:

  • Delete the directory var/plugins/KioskBundle/
  • Execute all installation steps again:
    • Copy files
    • Clear cache
    • Update database with bin/console kimai:bundle:kiosk:install
    • Update assets with bin/console assets:install

Changelog

Version 2.14.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.34.0

  • Better search logic, including negated search terms

Version 2.13.2

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.30.0

  • Hide System-Accounts from login screen
  • Use translation from Kimai core for navigation

Version 2.13.1

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.30.0

  • Fix error on empty code in login form

Version 2.13.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.30.0

  • Use non-deprecated API to fetch timesheets
  • Add “#kiosk-auth” to login screen for easier custom CSS rules
  • Order users by Alias

Version 2.12.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.25.0

  • Use translations from Kimai core
  • Internal refactoring: PHPStan v2 with strict and deprecation rules
  • Rename migration config for compatibility with new plugin installer

Version 2.11.1

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.21.0

  • Use MapEntity for routes to fix deprecations

Version 2.11.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.21.0

  • Removed duplicate “Barcode” link in user-profile

Version 2.10.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.21.0

  • Refactoring: use new query and repository methods

Version 2.9.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

  • Compatibility with composer installation
  • Inline Nelmio API Doc configuration
  • Inline JMS Serializer configuration

Version 2.8.2

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

  • Added support for NFC with Android-Kiosk: www.android-kiosk.com

Version 2.8.1

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

Changed: link to new documentation page

Version 2.8.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

  • Added: system configuration kiosk.enabled to disable Kiosk via local.yaml
  • Added: allow to set NFC code in edit screen via WebNFC
  • Changed: support attribute caching in Voter
  • Changed: simplified buttons in users kiosk profile

Version 2.7.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

  • Added: show kiosk codes as user profile tab
  • Added: permission kiosk_enabled to allow disabling Kiosk for entire user roles
  • Added: print barcode on click to the image
  • Changed: removed barcode_own_profile and barcode_other_profile permissions, replaced by kiosk_own_profile and kiosk_other_profile

Version 2.6.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.11.0

  • Changed: CSS files and language handling, required for Kimai 2.11.0
  • Changed: Replaced deprecated RestRoute attribute with SF native one

Version 2.5.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.1.0

Use annotation type for routes

Version 2.4.0

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.0.33

Fixed: possible pagination issues

Version 2.3.1

Compatibility: requires minimum Kimai 2.0.29

  • Fixed: upgraded quagga from 0.0.18 to 1.8.2
  • Fixed: upgraded bwip from 2.0.6 to 3.0.1

Demo

You can test this plugin at demo.kimai.org:

Username: susan_super
Password: password

Find more test accounts here.

Screenshots

Screenshot
Displays the list of all users with their configured login-code types
Screenshot
Configure your Kiosk plugin to your needs, login mode and code format depend on each other
Screenshot
This new barcode can now be printed and handed out to the user
Screenshot
The 'Barcode with USB scanner' login mode show a screen like this, the input field is pre-selected and the scanner will submit it after finding a code
Screenshot
The login screen with the optional user-list being activated
Screenshot
The 'Barcode with device cam' login mode will show the camera video and scan constantly for barcodes
Screenshot
Scanning an existing code for a user starts a new timesheet
Screenshot
Or when a timesheet is already running it will be stopped

FAQ

These FAQs are provided by the developer of this offer.

Buy now

All paid plugins are annual subscriptions. Read more about the exact license details here.

You can buy the plugin via the Marketplace LemonSqueezy and pay with Credit Card or PayPal for immediate access. You can also get in touch and pay with wire transfer or SEPA, but you will have to wait a few days before getting access to the plugin.

Basic support is included and I am happy to help occasionally with simple issues. Larger support-questions, bug-reports and feature-requests will be answered in this Github repository. Customers who bought a plugin including support can write to support@kimai.org.

If you purchase a plugin subscription, you’ll receive all updates, bugfixes, and support for one year. After the subscription ends, your plugin will continue to work without any restrictions – you can keep using the last version you downloaded. This model is known as a perpetual fallback license. However, access to future updates, new features, and compatibility fixes require an active subscription.

Since Kimai plugins are downloadable products, I am unable to offer refunds. Once you download the source code, it’s yours to keep, and I can’t retrieve it. The same applies for subscriptions that were not canceled in time.

Offered by

Kevin Papst

Building Kimai since 2009

If you have any question, please use the following contact information to get in touch with the developer directly.
Homepage Email GitHub
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