PassPerso: personal access codes

Our own access control solution: it opens doors, controls lighting and heating based on each user's personal access code.

Overview

PassPerso is our access control solution, developed with the company Berry Automatisme and installed in more than 80 sports clubs. It is the only one of the four solutions designed and maintained by our own teams: it was built from the outset to work with your calendars, with no intermediate gateway.

A controller installed on site stays permanently connected to your account. For every booking, it knows who is allowed in and at what times, without any action on your part.

Each user has their own access code, which they enter on a keypad at the entrance. For a court booked from 4 pm to 5 pm, their code will open the court doors from 3:55 pm to 5:05 pm, for example, with a configurable tolerance.

Download the brochure (PDF)

What the solution brings day to day

• Nothing to hand out: the code is created and sent to the user automatically when their account is opened.
• Nothing to withdraw: a user moved to the trash sees their code stop working immediately.
• A main entrance secured over a time range of your choosing, independently of bookings.
• Hardware and an installation designed for your organization, with support all the way to commissioning.
• Access data sent to ADOC for organizations affiliated to the French Tennis Federation.

Opening the player's whole route

A single booking can open several successive doorways: the main gate, the club house, the changing rooms, the showers, or a second court door that has no keypad. The player enters one code and follows their route to the court.

The club house, the changing rooms and the gate are each set according to one of two approaches, as you prefer: a fixed time range — Monday to Friday from 8 am to 10 pm, for example — or an opening conditional on a booking in progress.

A keypad can also control a racket locker, so that equipment is made available with the same code as the booking.

Four types of code for four situations

1. The personal code, unique to each user. It only opens the courts they have booked, at the agreed times, with the tolerance set before and after the time slot. It is the only one your users know.
2. The label code, which opens the doors of the courts occupied by a booking with a label: tennis school, training, training camp. It is used by the players as well as the coach, who can also use their personal code.
3. The free-access code, which unlocks a door for an indefinite period, until the same code is entered again to close it. This is the code used by the caretaker who opens the premises for the day, or by the coach who leaves access open during their class.
4. The permanent code, which opens any door at any time.

The last three are reserved for managers: do not share them with players. They are supplied with a default value, to be personalised as soon as the system goes live, from the computer installed on site.

Whatever the code, entry is confirmed with the hash key — or the star key. Without confirmation, the keypad sends nothing. An accepted code then triggers a four-second pulse on the door, long enough to enter; only free access keeps the door open.

What the installation includes

A programmable controller with relay outputs drives the keypads, the strike plates, the lighting and the heating. It communicates over a serial link with a mini-computer that we supply, already fitted with our control software, tested and ready to plug in.

This computer is the only item to connect to the Internet. Any connection will do: ADSL, cable, fibre or 4G. It regularly retrieves the bookings from your account and drives the controller accordingly.

The number of keypads does not necessarily match the number of courts. An isolated court gets its own; two courts sharing the same gate need only one; a group of courts each with its own door needs as many. It is this real-world layout that determines the hardware, not the number of courts in your schedule.

Enabling the module and setting the codes

1. Open Administration›Settings›Access Control & Piloting, then More Information on the PassPerso record.
2. Enable the module.
3. Enable With Access Codes.

Then set the length of the codes (from 4 to 8 digits). The Generate a unique access code for each user option gives each person their own code, instead of a single code shared across the whole organization: this is the option to favour, since each opening can then be traced back to someone.

When the module is enabled, a code is assigned in one go to every user already present in your database. So you have no catching up to do at the start, and each account created afterwards receives its own code automatically.

You have nothing to hand out either. The code is sent to the user by e-mail when their account is created, along with their login details, then displayed on screen after each booking and repeated in the confirmations sent by e-mail and by SMS. Everyone can find it again at any time from their account.

You can change one person's code, or regenerate all the codes at the start of the season, from the user management section.

Setting the codes and the timings on the computer

Users' personal codes are managed from your account. Everything else — service codes, time tolerances, lighting and heating timings — is set on the computer connected to the controller.

The control software deliberately has no configuration screen: each setting is a small text file, in a single folder. Open it with Notepad, replace the value, save.

The available settings

They all live in C:\ballejaune\datas.

The heating accepts a negative value in cha_apres.txt: -15 stops it a quarter of an hour before the end of the time slot, the remaining warmth being enough to finish the game.

A code set to 0 is disabled. That is how you do without the free-access code if you do not want one.

What to know before making changes

Service codes can be longer than your users' personal codes, and this is recommended — up to eight digits. They open far more doors, so they deserve to be harder to guess.

A change is taken into account around thirty seconds after saving, with nothing to restart. Two exceptions are for the installer rather than for you: the strike plate type and the serial port number, which require the software to be restarted.

Controlling lighting and heating

PassPerso does more than open the door: it gets the court ready. Two trigger modes exist, to be chosen according to your habits.

In the mode linked to access codes, the court lighting and heating come on when a player listed on the booking enters their code. Nothing is triggered if nobody turns up, which avoids lighting a court that a player booked and then forgot.

In automatic mode, the lighting and heating follow the bookings directly, for example from five minutes before the start of the time slot. This is the mode to choose when players must find the court already lit on arrival.

In both cases, everything switches off automatically a configurable number of minutes after the end of the booking.

Consulting the access log

The file C:\ballejaune\trace\trace.txt records the system's activity, on the disk of the computer installed on site. Despite its extension, it is a tabular file separated by semicolons: open it in a spreadsheet rather than a text editor, and the columns will line up by themselves.

Each line carries the computer's time and our servers' time — a gap between the two is a clue in itself.

Two distinct events appear there for a single entry. The request records the code entered on the keypad, whether it was accepted or not: this is where you find mistyped entries and attempts. The actual access identifies the person, states whether it stems from a booking or a label, and names the court concerned — useful when two courts share a door.

The log also records software start-ups, a heartbeat every thirty minutes and the status of the connections. This is what makes it possible to date an interruption precisely, long after the event.

So this is the record to consult in the event of a dispute — missing equipment, a court found in a mess, a door left open: each entry is linked to the code that triggered it, and therefore to a person.

Reading the control screen

The computer permanently displays a dashboard, which you only have to look at to know whether all is well. It is the first thing to check when you are on site.

At the top, two indicators must be green: communication with the controller, and the connection with our servers. If the second is red, you are in the case described further down this page — bookings are no longer being transmitted.

The screen also shows the active timings, in a directly readable form: court access, lighting and heating, each with its minutes before and after the time slot. This is the surest way to check that a file change has been taken into account.

Lastly, the current or next booking appears there, court by court, with the time and the player or the label. A player who claims they cannot get in while the screen shows no booking in their name gives you the answer immediately.

Monitoring the unit's connection

The software installed on the computer connected to the controller regularly retrieves the bookings and drives the opening of the doors.

Open Administration›Settings›Access Control & Piloting, then Configure on the PassPerso record: the Connection Status block shows the status of this link — Login Successful, Connection disrupted, Login Failed or Connection not established — and how long it has been since the information was refreshed.

A failed connection does not block configuration: you can enable the module and prepare the codes even before the installation is finished.

Enable Email Alerts to be alerted without having to watch this screen: enter up to four addresses, one per line, and the delay after which the alert is triggered (from 5 to 60 minutes of interruption). A second e-mail confirms that service has been restored.

Linking accesses to ADOC (FFT)

Organizations affiliated to the French Tennis Federation can send access data to ADOC.

1. Enable Integration with ADOC (FFT).
2. Fill in the Club Code and the Security Key provided by the federation.
3. For each court, enter its Court Name and its Court ID on the ADOC side, then Add a court for the next line.

Matching the courts is essential: without it, accesses are sent without any way of knowing which court to attach them to.

Restoring access codes that no longer work

Your users report that their personal code is refused at the entrance, even though the bookings are properly recorded on your side. In almost every case, the installation is not to blame: it is the link between the on-site computer and our servers that has been broken.

The unmistakable sign

If the permanent code still opens the doors while personal codes are refused, you have your diagnosis.

The permanent code is stored in the controller and works without asking anyone for anything. Codes linked to bookings, on the other hand, depend on synchronisation. When the former work and the latter do not, the controller and the keypads are fine — only the link is down.

Dating the break

The Connection Status block, described above, gives the date of the last contact with the on-site computer. Read it as the moment when your bookings stopped being transmitted: everything booked since then is unknown to the controller, and will stay that way until service is restored.

The three possible causes

The computer connected to the controller no longer has Internet access, Windows has frozen, or the control software has stopped. These can be told apart on site, in this order.

Going on site

The computer is a small square PC, next to the controller. Proceed in this order: each step rules out a cause, and the last is the most drastic.

1. If you have a screen, plug it in. You will see immediately which of the three causes applies, which will save you the trial and error that follows.
2. Check the connection: from your phone, connect over WiFi to the site's router and see whether the Internet is working. If it is not, you have found the cause — it is the router or the line that needs restoring, not the computer.
3. If the Internet is working, two possibilities remain: Windows has frozen, or only our control software has stopped. With a screen, the difference is obvious — a frozen Windows responds neither to the mouse nor to the keyboard.
4. If Windows responds, simply restart our control software from its shortcut on the desktop. This is the lightest intervention, and it is enough in many cases.
5. If Windows does not respond, or if you have no screen, restart the computer using the button on its side, then wait. This can be done without a screen, but a screen is still preferable in order to follow the start-up.

Once the link is restored

Whether you restarted the software or rebooted the computer, the control software re-establishes contact with our servers — after a reboot, it starts up on its own. You then receive an e-mail confirming that the connection has been restored.

Let us know at that point: we analyse the incident through a remote session, to prevent it from happening again.

Contact

As PassPerso is our own solution, it is our team that answers you, from the first discussion through to commissioning.

The Request a Quote button, on the solution's record, sends your request to our team, who will study your facilities and propose the appropriate configuration.

Gathering these few details before the first discussion saves a round trip:

• the number of courts and the number of doors giving access to them, indicating any gates shared by two courts;
• the shared accesses to secure — club house, changing rooms, main gate — and, for each one, whether it should open over a fixed time range or only for a booking in progress;
• the courts on which you wish to control the lighting or the heating, and whether a light sensor would be useful;
• any equipment lockers to be made available to players.

You can also contact us directly:

• Contact form: openresa.com/contact
• E-mail: support@openresa.com