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Location-aware Event Attendance System using QR Code and GPS Technology

Article  in  International Journal of Advanced Computer Science and Applications · January 2018

DOI: 10.14569/IJACSA.2018.090959

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 (IJACSA) International Journal of Advanced Computer Science and Applications,
Vol. 9, No. 9, 2018

Location-aware Event Attendance System using QR

Code and GPS Technology
Zakiah Ayop1, Chan Yee Lin2, Syarulnaziah Anawar3, Erman Hamid4, Muhammad Syahrul Azhar5
Center for Advanced Computing Technology (C-ACT),
Faculty of Information and Communication Technology, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka,
Hang Tuah Jaya, 76100 Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia.

Abstract—Attendance process in a university’s event is time This paper is organized as follows. Section II discusses
consuming and tracking the attendance can be harder. In this previous studies in attendance management system, QR code,
paper, a smart event attendance system for a university using QR and GPS solution. Section III describes the methodology used
code and GPS technology is proposed with objective to speed up to develop the student attendance system. Section IV outlines
the process of taking students’ attendance and tracking full the implementation of this study, the discussion on system
attendance. The method of developing the system is based on two evaluation is provided in Section V, followed by conclusion in
views; user view which is the mobile application used by the Section VI.
students, and admin view which is the web administration system
used by the event organizer. From the evaluation, students’ II. RELATED WORKS
attendance can be traced from the GPS location combine with
QR code. The results indicate that full attendance increases as Conventional attendance system is still used in most
the system validates attendance through users’ identification, universities. However, this type of attendance system suffers
location and timestamp during user login and logout. The problem like missing name, false attendance, missing
proposed system contributes to high satisfaction among the users attendance sheet, and tedious management. The advancement
that claim that the mobile application helps to speed up the event in attendance system has incorporate technological tools to
registration process. improve the shortcomings in conventional system. In this
section, various technologies used to support current work in
Keywords—Event attendance system; quick response (QR) the attendance system will be discussed.
code; global positioning system (GPS); android mobile application
An efficient web-based application for attendance
I. INTRODUCTION management system is designed to track students‟ activity in
In this era, smartphones play a significant role in our daily the class by using the electronic methods [2]. Besides, the
lives. The emergence of mobile application, has been impacted attendance records are stored in the database and this system is
by the convergent factors such as high-speed data network, developed with the usage of Model, View and Controller
relatively cheap devices, high-performing devices, easy-to-use (MVC) architecture with the assistance of power of Laravel
market places for apps, and the need for simple, targeted Framework. The purpose of this system is to differentiate the
applications while mobile [1]. hours of theoretical and practical lessons since the calculation
method for the absence rate of students for these lessons are
Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UTeM) is the 14th different.
public university in Malaysia. This university consists of three
campuses which are the main campus, technology campus, and On the other hand, biometric technologies such as face [3],
city campus. The university organizes various events for the fingerprint [4], and iris [5] recognition have been introduced as
students from different campuses. Hence, there will be students‟ identification and reduce the false attendance
hundreds of students that will take part in the events, thus problem. Although biometric identification prevents fake
making the attendance taking process time consuming and may attendance and proxies, it requires some efficient recognition
delay the start time of the event. algorithms [6] and higher computation power on the mobile
phone, thus increasing deployment cost.
Therefore, the purpose of this study is two-fold: First, to
investigate the requirements in event attendance for a The emergence of sensors has innovated the technology in
university‟s event, and second, to develop a mobile application smartphones and Student Identification (ID) card which
that utilizes the QR code and GPS location. A proof of concept facilitate the authentication process. Technology such as
for the proposed solution is developed. The system consists of barcode [7], Bluetooth [8], RFID [9] and NFC [10] are used in
admin view for event‟s organizer to create an encrypted QR attendance system to improve the weaknesses in biometric
code, and a user view for students to log in the university site system. However, there is concern in substantial additional cost
by using unique matric number and password, scanning the QR to the university, namely hardware reader to track the ID [11].
code shown by the organizer and their current location which is Hence, QR code based system which is a combination of
tracked by the GPS as the attendance. The user view will then mobile devices to display and scan the QR code is introduced.
communicate the information collected to the admin view to An online student attendance monitoring system (SAMS)
confirm the attendance. based on QR code and mobile devices is developed in [11]. It

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seems quantitatively easier to discern the students based on identified (refer Table I). Hardware and software requirement
their diligence in attending classes and predict their has been specified in Table II and Table III.
performance due to the correlation between the attendance and
academic performance. Besides, the main advantage of this TABLE I. FUNCTIONAL REQUIREMENT
system is to record and monitor student attendance in a more
accurate and quicker way. There are two main components in Event Attendance System
this system, which are SAMS server and SAMS application.
The system itself is available online and designed for access Purpose Event Attendance
via mobile devices. A unique QR code is generated and sent
for each student by email and it is used to record attendance. Platform Android, Web
These QR code are presented by students to their lecturer either
using their smart phone or with a print out, and later scanned  Name
 Student Matric Number
by the lecturer using the SAMS application. However, we Student
 Faculty
noticed that SAMS requires lecturers‟ intervention which can information
 Course
disturb the class delivery. Therefore, in order to avoid
interruption, a proposed solution is offered by Masalha and  Event name
Hirzallah [12], where students are required to scan the QR code  Event Location
Event
by using a specific mobile application before or during the Information  Event Date
class. The QR code is pasted on each displayed lecture slide.  Event Start Time, End Time
The identity of the student is identified when he or she scans
the generated QR code, and the attendance is taken and sent to
TABLE II. HARDWARE REQUIREMENT
the university‟s server [12]. Other solution in [12] also includes
face recognition that is applied to perform identity verification.
A location check will be performed to verify the users‟ Event Attendance System
location. However, lecturer need to design and develop a
specific QR code for each student and this method is not Hardware Purpose/Usage
suitable for the process attendance of event.
Laptop with 2GHz CPU, 4GB Specification for system
Nonetheless, the main weakness in current works in RAM development
attendance system is the current location of students is not
tracked when they take the attendance by using the student Mobile phone with Android 4.4 Mobile application settings
system for testing and deployment
attendance system. This weakness can be seen in SAMS [11],
the attendance checking system using QR code in University
Sulaimaniyah in Iraq [13] and the smart attendance system in TABLE III. SOFTWARE REQUIREMENT
Institute of Hydropower Engineering and Technology [14].
Hence, cheating phenomena could have happened among Event Attendance System
students when they used these systems. Besides, the SAMS
[11] is inappropriate for the process of students‟ attendance in Software Purpose/Usage
event because a unique QR code is generated and delivered to
each student by email, which is not suitable due to high Official IDE for system
overhead when the students coming from different faculties. Android Studio 3.0
development
Consequently, we propose to develop an improved Event Mobile application platform
Android SDK v19
Attendance System which based on the features that has been for testing
discussed above. The event attendance system implemented in
this project is a software application created using Android To meet the requirements set by PPPK, the non-functional
Studio to ensure only the authorized students can login into the requirements will evaluate [15]:
system by using their unique matric number and password. 1) Performance: The system is capable to scan the QR
Besides, the login and logout time of students and their current
code based on various setting of lighting, angle and distance.
location which is tracked by GPS sensor will be recorded and
stored in database as the attendance. In addition, the process of 2) User Acceptance: To demonstrate how the design
taking attendance can be speed up as the event organizer only affects the usage of the application by the user, a preliminary
needs to create an encrypted QR code with the event study is conducted that use a quantitative methodology. A
information provided. structured questionnaire is used to collect data survey from 20
students who have different levels of IT skill. The objective of
III. METHODOLOGY this study is to measure the user satisfaction toward the
A. Requirement Analysis application.
Prior to this project, we performed requirement analysis in B. System Flow
a meeting with the IT Operation officers from IT Centre Figure 1 shows the flow chart of user view for Event
(PPPK) in the UTeM. Based on the discussions, the functional Attendance System. The android application allows a student
requirements specification for the proposed system has been

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to login into the system. After successfully login into the

system, the student will select „SCAN THE QR CODE‟ button
to scan the QR code which is generated by the university‟s
event organizer. After the scanning process, the information
about the event which is included in the QR code, the student‟s
location, and student identity will be sent to database server.
This is to ensure that the student is within the event
hall/location when he or she is registering their attendance. The
attendance will only be saved in database when the student
scans the QR code 15 minutes before the event starts, and
needs to logout within 15 minutes after the event ended.

Fig. 2. Flow chart of admin view

IV. IMPLEMENTATION
A. System Architecture
Figure 3 shows the architecture of the proposed system.
First, the user needs to log in the system by using their email
address and password. After that, the student needs to scan the
QR code that is provided by the organizer. When the student
uses the android application to scan the QR code, the
application will request the location of the student to ensure he
or she is at the correct location to take the attendance.

Fig. 1. Flow chart of user view

Figure 2 shows the flow chart of the admin view. The

system administor is able to choose different options in the
main menu page. If administrator select the Student Attendance
option, he or she can search an event name for viewing all
students‟ attendance who participated in the event. Besides,
administrator is allowed to view the particular event details if
he or she indicates the Event Details selection. In addition,
administrator is able to add a new event details which will be
saved in database and generate a QR code that consists of the
event data in Add Event and QR code generator respectively.
Lastly, administrator is capable to view the student details on Fig. 3. System Architecture
Student Details page according to the searched matric number.

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B. Experimental Setup
The system evaluation is conducted in Universiti Teknikal
Malaysia Melaka (UTeM). 20 students who have different
levels of IT skill from different faculties were selected to test
the system. We created two events for the purpose of
evaluation; Hacking Event and Workshop 2 Briefing, with
different location for each event. We conducted three types of
evaluation to meet the system requirements, namely system
functionality, system performance and user acceptance.
The system consists of two views; user view which
accessible through mobile application and admin view from
web administration system. Further discussion on both views is
provided in the Section C and D.
C. User View: Mobile Application
Mobile application contains four modules: Login, QR code
Scanner, GPS and Attendance modules. In Figure 4, the details
of the student such as username, name, faculty, course and
login time which are stored in database will be displayed if
they successfully log into system. For attendance input, the
student needs to press on the „SCAN THE QR CODE‟ button Fig. 5. Activity Scan Barcode Interface
for scanning the QR code.

Fig. 4. Event Selection Interface Fig. 6. Barcode Result and Request GPS Interface

In Figure 5, the student needs to scan the QR code which Figure 7 shows the application tracking the current location
contains the event‟s information by using the QR code scanner. of the student. In Figure 8, the event‟s details such as event
The event‟s details that is extracted from the QR code will be name, current location and event end time will be displayed in
displayed in this page and saved in database (refer Figure 6). this page. Besides, the username, student name, and login time
Additionally, student can request their current GPS location by of the student will be called from database and displayed on the
pressing Send Request button. The current location of the page. To ensure the attendance is taken, Logout button should
student will be tracked and later saved in database. The be pressed once the event ended for student to logout from the
acceptance of student attendance is notified by displaying the system. However, if student logout from the system before the
username, student name and event‟s details on the mobile page. event ended, the attendance will not be taken.

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Fig. 9. Web Administration Main Menu

Fig. 7. Detect GPS Location Interface

Fig. 10. Add Event

Fig. 8. Logout page Interface

Fig. 11. QR Code Generator
D. Admin View: Web Administration System
On Web Administration main menu page (refer Figure 9),
there are five modules that needs to be manage; Add Event
(refer Figure 10), QR Code Generator (refer Figure 11), Event
Details (refer Figure 12), Student Attendance (refer Figure 13),
and Student Details (refer Figure 14).
To register new event, administrator can add the event
details and save to the database as in Figure 10. Administrator
will generate the event QR code on the page. Besides,
administrator can choose the size and error correction of the
QR code (refer Figure 11). Event details will be displayed on
the page (refer Figure 12).

Fig. 12. Event Details

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In Figure 13, administrator can view the students‟ B. Performance Evaluation

attendance according to a specific event. Students‟ attendance Three parameters are used to evaluate the performance of
will be displayed on the page. Students‟ attendance list can be the system:
downloaded in Excel format.
1) Angle degree: the angle degree for handling the device
In Figure 14, administrator can view the student‟s details
when scanning the QR code.
according to a specific matric number and the student details
will be displayed. 2) Distance: the distance between the device and QR code
3) Brightness level: the level of brightness of the device
These performance parameters are selected to ensure the
system can be performed in a high effectiveness [15].
Table IV, V and VI illustrate the performance of each
parameter selected in this study. In Table IV, four angle
degrees are evaluated namely 30, 45, 90 and 120 degrees. From
the table, it can be seen that successful QR scanning applies
only for 90 degrees‟ angle.

TABLE IV. RESULT FOR ANGLE DEGREE

Angle for handling the Status
device (degree) (Pass/Fail)
30 Fail
Fig. 13. Student Attendance Filtered By Events
45 Fail

90 Pass

120 Fail

The results from Table IV shows that 90 degree is the

preferred angle to handle the device when scanning the QR
code. However, the status is Fail when user handle the device
by using 30 degree, 45 degree, and 120 degree. This may be
due to handling the device using these three angles will
produce partial view of the QR code, thus making the system
unable to detect the QR code. Besides, distance between the
Fig. 14. Student Details device and QR code plays an important role in this test.
V. EVALUATION AND DISCUSSION In Table V, four distance evaluation is performed namely 3,
6, 9 and 12 cm. From the table it can be seen that successful
System evaluation is conducted to verify system
QR scanning applies only on distance of 3 cm and 6 cm.
functionality, system effectiveness, and user satisfaction.
A. System Functionality TABLE V. PERFORMANCE TEST OF DISTANCE BETWEEN THE DEVICE AND
THE QR CODE
User view and admin view are evaluated in integration test
to examine the functionality of all the components together. Distance between the device Status
and QR code (cm) (Pass/Fail)
Testing used wireless services provided by the university
without increment of bandwidth from the IT Center and also 3 Pass
mobile service provider. All modules in mobile application 6 Pass
successfully connected to the database in the Web 9 Fail
Administration system. This concludes that the user view and
12 Fail
the admin view are functionally capable to operate.
Authentication for the system is unique as they used email From the results in Table V, 3cm and 6cm are the most
which consists of student matric number. The application will suitable distance among these distances during the scanning of
check the identity based on the student database stored in the the QR code, whereas the status of 9cm and 12cm are Fail.
Firebase cloud. Registration of the event is design to make sure These two distances of device are too far away from the QR
the student will participate in the event to the end. In this case, code and the system is unable to detect the QR code.
unless the student did not logout, their attendance will not be In Table VI, four level of brightness evaluation is
counted. In addition, there is condition to be met; they can only performed namely 10%, 30%, 60% and 100%. From the table,
logout after the event ended. it can be seen that successful scanning applies on 60% and
100% brightness.

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TABLE VI. PERFORMANCE TEST OF BRIGTNESS LEVEL OF THE DEVICE smartphones are slow to display GPS location; thus the score is
WHEN SCANNING THE QR CODE
low. The average mean of the satisfaction and future use
Level of brightness of device (%)
Status category is 4.80. Therefore, it can be concluded that most of
(Pass/Fail) the users are satisfied with this application for taking the
10 Fail attendance as its mean is 4.90.
30 Fail
60 Pass VI. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK
100 Pass Location-aware Event Attendance System using QR code
From Table VI, 60% and 100% are the ideal brightness for and GPS technology is implemented using android application
the device to detect the QR code and extract the data inside it. and Firebase database in cloud to manage the attendance
Nevertheless, 10% and 30% of brightness is not suitable for information. From the evaluation, the proposed system was
device to detect the QR code because there is not enough light capable to take the student attendance by scanning the QR
to decode the data that encoded in the QR code. code. The GPS location, time login and logout were tracked to
ensure full attendance. We found positive feedback for the
C. User Acceptance Evaluation system in the user acceptance test. However, this system can
Upon data collection, the level of acceptance was only support android application which makes it inconvenient
investigated by evaluating the application user interface for iOS users. Furthermore, the proposed system is only
quality, reliability, satisfaction and future use. capable of tracking the location without calculating the
distance to the event venue. In addition, the application also
TABLE VII. USER ACCEPTANCE TEST needs strong Internet connection.
St. Avg For future work, we plan to improve the application
Description Mean
Dev. Mean operability to support both android and iOS smart phone. To
Interface Quality calculate the distance between the user and the venue, we
The way I interact with the 4.80 0.51 4.90 propose to incorporate Google Maps Distance Matrix API in
application is pleasant. the application. To decrease false attendance and secure
The application is intuitive and user 4.95 0.21
friendly and easy to understand.
authentication, the authors also plan to apply factor-based
I think that I would not need the 5.00 0.00 authentication scheme with low cost method in the application
support of a technical person when [16]. This study can be extended to other areas such as
using this application. recommender system.
I found that various functions in 4.85 0.36
this system were well integrated. ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Reliability
The authors gratefully acknowledge the help of the
Time is saved and the purpose to 4.50 0.74 4.52 Knowledge and Communication Services Centre, UTeM in
avoid the event start lately is providing the requirement in this research. A high appreciation
achieved.
The QR code scanner of the 4.90 0.30
to Center of Advanced Computing Technology (C-ACT),
application is able to scan the QR Fakulti Teknologi Maklumat dan Komunikasi, Universiti
code in high efficiency. Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UTeM) for supporting the work
User‟s current location is tracked 4.15 0.85 done in this paper.
correctly by using the application.
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