Introduction
This article explains how the "Entrance Flow Management" sample experience was built and how you can reuse it for your own needs. To access this sample, download it using the Examples tab of the Experiences panel in Composer. You can also download it from this page in the Intuiface Examples catalog.
This sample experience illustrates how Intuiface can be used to track and communicate the number of people in a location and whether additional people may enter based on the maximum capacity. Although it can be used as-is, we encourage users to treat it as a starting point for creating their own custom solution.
NOTE: There is a variation of this experience using Nexmosphere sensors to automatically record visitor movement in and out of a facility. This alternative experience is fully self-contained, requiring no manual intervention, but is limited to one display.
Video
How it works
Experience structure
The "Entrance Flow Management" sample experience is actually comprised of two experiences, Main and Additional.
The Main experience is mandatory and can operate alone. It is responsible for keeping track of the entry and exit counts, comparing the latest count to capacity, and displaying enter/wait guidance based on that comparison. It should be placed at the primary (aka the main) entrance.
For locations with more than one entrance, run the Additional experience at all but the primary entrance. It mirrors the entry/wait guidance monitored by the Main experience.
Entry and exit counts are communicated to the Main experience through a variety of means, including human-assisted approaches as well as through an automated counting system. Regardless of the method chosen, the result is a modification of a Simple Counter.
The logic behind the usage of this counter can be summarized in the following diagram:
Human-assisted counting
One simple and low-cost method for count communication is the use of a clicker that can simulate keyboard keypress events and send them to the Player device running the Main experience.
Another way to count the coming and going of visitors is through the use of a web page on a personal mobile device, designed to communicate with either the Main or Additional experience using Web Triggers, just as has been done in the Real Estate Shop Window and Multi-mode Interaction samples.
Automated counting
Human-assisted counting can be replaced by an automated approach, such as computer vision-enabled or sensor-based entry/exit counts, as long as those counts can be transmitted to Intuiface via local network triggers, web triggers, a Web API, or a custom interface asset. Below are a few examples that can easily be integrated within this reference design:
- In-house computer-vision-based solution using OpenCV and/or OpenVINO, such as the one used in the video above. The proof of concept used in the video was built on top of this Intel Multi-Person Tracking Demo.
- Dedicated hardware/middleware such as the AXIS People Counter solution, potentially reusing CCTV cameras already deployed on-site.
- 3D cameras like Intel RealSense and associated middleware like Enliteon are easy to integrate with Intuiface.
- If the venue can impose a few preconditions, such as requiring separate entrance and exit doors, limiting entry to one person at a time, and preventing direct sunlight exposure, then sensors like the Nexmosphere presence sensor can be used out of the box with Intuiface. See Nexmosphere details here.
Settings scene
In the Main experience is an interactive "Settings" scene. With this scene, the Entry Monitor can change the maximum facility capacity, scan a QR code that opens an Intuiface-authored webpage acting as a remote control, and update the credential key used to specify the specific Intuiface account associated with the Players running Main and Additional. (This credential key is embedded in the QR code.)
The following image, taken from the My Credential Keys page, shows you the required configuration for the key you will use in the Entrance Flow Management sample.
The Additional experience contains a similar Settings scene, displaying a QR code that opens the Intuiface-authored webpage acting as a mobile phone. This enables Entry Monitors at secondary entrances to record entry and exit counts.
To access the "Settings" scene in either the Main or Additional experience when they're running, use one of two methods.
- click 's' on a physical keyboard attached to the device running Composer/Player.
or - double-tap the white rectangle at the top of the messaging scene
In the Main experience, be sure to click the "Save" button after entering a new capacity or credential key.
Multi-Entrance Deployment
The Additional experience is constructed to be placed at all but the primary entrance. It mirrors the entry/wait guidance determined by the Main experience.
You can download the experience for Additional Display from this page in the Intuiface Examples catalog.
To link one or more instances of the Additional experience to the Main experience, we use the first Player tag assigned to all Players via the Player Detail view accessed in the Share and Deploy Console. This first tag should be identical across all Players.
NOTE: Player tagging, and thus the use of the Additional experience, is a feature exclusive to Enterprise-level Intuiface accounts. Any level Intuiface account can use the Main experience.
In the image above, Player on the device named ALLIUM will be linked to all other Players that have "MainStreetStore" as the first tag.
Tracking visitor count with a personal mobile device
This interaction approach uses the mechanism explained in our Real Estate Shop Window sample, using a mobile phone to remotely control onscreen content. The Entrance Flow Management sample improves the existing mechanism by including the experience name and Player tag in the QR Code. The QR Code is different for each instance of the Main and optional Additional displays to distinguish one entrance from another when using Intuiface Analytics.
The QR Code leads the user to the following webpage, created outside of Intuiface.
Make sure your Intuiface account's Web Triggers credential key has been entered either in the "Settings" Excel worksheet before running the experience or in the Settings scene after running the experience.
When the user clicks a button on the webpage, a call is made using the Web Triggers API. On the experience side, the "Message is received" trigger listens for a message, and when one is received, it calls the appropriate associated increment or decrement action.
The source code for the webpage is available here:
Analytics
This "Entrance Flow Management" sample uses the Data Tracking Interface Asset to log user actions for Analytics. You can create a dashboard capturing data that can be used to answer any or all of the following questions:
- Capacity percent per hour in a day
- Average number of customers in-store per hour in a day
- Total number of customers in-store
- Entrance usage percent (when using more than one entrance)
- Average wait time (single value)
- Average wait time per hour in a day
How average wait time is calculated
When the "Wait" layer is displayed (i.e. the red warning sign asking newcomers to stop and wait):
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“Display Stop” counter is incremented by 1
This counter will total the number of times people are told to wait. -
chronometer is started
This timer will measure how long the "Wait" layer is displayed
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when the "Wait" layer is hidden - i.e. when the number of visitors has fallen below capacity - the chronometer is paused
The chronometer is not reset. It is restarted from where it left off every time the "Wait" layer is displayed. - the chronometer value is divided by the "Display Stop" counter
The result is the average wait time
For instance, if the "Wait" layer is displayed:
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1 time for 40 sec, the Average Wait Time is 40 seconds
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2 times for an accumulated total of 250 sec, the Average Wait Time is 125 seconds (250/2)
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10 times for an accumulated total of 2500 sec, the Average Wait Time is 250 seconds (2500/10)
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