Covid Tracker with CAC scanner

Physically "logging" events ought to be a thing of the past. In the Marine Corps, that aging concept still lives on. This proof of concept is there to help supplement or remove a physical Marine to write anything down. With the pandemic of the Coronavirus, logging who enters an establishment becomes increasingly important to mitigate community spread of the virus.

Problem

Camp Hansen Exchange assigned multiple Marines to manually log anyone who enters the building. During rush hours, a very long line could be seen coming out of the entrance. Once someone reaches the front, a Marine will take basic information and “legibly” transcribe it on loose printed log sheets. Sometimes, they will have the individual write their own information down with the same pen. Some issues arise such as the validity of who actually wrote what. The problems are the unintentional spread due to a single pen, legibility of the handwriting, the validity of the individual, and the quick seartch of an individual. This could cause a second or third-order effect in regards to tracing who was a close contact or a positive case.

Solution

Common Access Cards (CAC) are widely owned for anyone wanting access to a federal location such as a military base. Therefore, they ought to be used for the logging process. With a good scanner (see below for specifics) and CACs, logging events to track individuals will provide a stand-alone technology solution.

Hardware Requirements

1. Any Hands-Free and automatic scanner with a specification to read the 2D PDF417 type barcodes. That is because the front of the CAC is a 2D PDF417 type barcode
   1. For example: I used the TEEMI Handsfree 1D 2D Barcode Scanner bought on Amazon. For a military purchase, please see your supply about purchasing it through Servmart or other government procurement avenue.
2. Laptop or raspberry pi

Software Requirements

1. Installation of Docker
2. Installation of Python3
3. Recommend: Ubuntu Operating System

Set Up

1. git clone https://github.com/marinecoders/covid_tracker_scanner.git
2. cd covid_tracker_scanner
3. Create .env in the covid_project directory with something like:

DJ_SECRET_KEY=super-secret-key
DJ_ALLOWED_HOSTS=localhost 127.0.0.1 [::1] 0.0.0.0
DJ_DEBUG=True
SQL_ENGINE=django.db.backends.postgresql
SQL_DATABASE=change_database_name
SQL_USER=change_super_cool_user
SQL_PASSWORD=change_super_secret_password
SQL_HOST=db
SQL_PORT=5432

4. Create .env.db in the covid_project directory with something like:

POSTGRES_DB=change_database_name
POSTGRES_USER=change_super_cool_user
POSTGRES_PASSWORD=change_super_secret_password

5. go back to the root directory with the docker-compose file
6. docker-compose up --build
7. There might be an error that the database does not exist.
   1. If so, run docker-compose down -v then docker-compose up --build
   2. Afterwards, in a different terminal at the same directory, you might need to apply the tables to the database with docker-compose exec web python manage.py migrate
8. Open a browser and navigate to localhost:8000

Creating a .desktop file for execution (ONLY WORKS ON UBUNTU OS)

Thank can only work if and only if docker-compose is up and running. Thoughts about automating the docker-compose is to run it upon start up so that the user does not have to do anything execpt the below.

This is to help the automation to "Marine proof" the application

1. Have the docker-compose run on start up through the Startup Application Preferences
2. Create the file as example.desktop to launch the browser to the correct url Add the following

   [Desktop Entry]
   Name=Example Name
   Comment=Launch browser to running application
   Exec=sh -c "path/to/run_me.sh"
   Icon=/path/to/cool/icon.svg
   Terminal=false
   Type=Application
   Version=1.0
   

   Take note of the run_me.sh. You will have to create that file at the path you determined
3. Create the path/to/run_me.sh. Inside it should look something like:

   #!/bin/bash
   firefox http://localhost:8000   

4. ensure to make it executable with chmod +x run_me.sh
5. Afterwards, make sure the example.desktop can be be launched by right clicking on it and select Allow Launching
6. See the icon change.

Built With

• Django - High-Level Python Web Framework
• Docker - Containerization
• Bootstrap - Front-End open source toolkit