Diamond Rings and More

Posts Tagged ‘RFID’

Nowadays most people and their grandmothers are using computers on a daily basis to access the Internet and even the so-called computer illiterate operate computers in items that they have not yet grasped contain them. We are all working with computers all the time whether we realize it or not.

Equipment at work, the car, the mobile telephone and the ATM all have computers built-in to make them more efficient or indeed to make them work at all. Everyone should strive to take that small leap to learning how to make use of a computer with a keyboard, especially if they are under fifty.

Not only are we all working with computers, but we are all working with mainframes – the type of computers that NASA applications for its calculations. Where?, you might ask. Well, when you go to the self-service garage and punch in what you want and how you are going to pay for it, the computer on the petrol pump checks its supplies to see whether it can supply that amount

Then it tells HQ that it has delivered that amount and that stock levels have to be decreased by that amount; then it checks you credit card details with the banks’ mainframes and then you are free to have your card back and go on your way. And not before. If you do attempt to get away early, it will already have taken a snapshot of your face and probably your car’s registration plate as well.

Do you have a security tag to get into work? That will be an RFID (radio frequency ID) tag, which will be communicating with the firm’s mainframe computer to tell it that ‘employee xxx’ has turned up for work and it will probably keep details of where you are at every other moment of the day too.

Some individuals used to enjoy doing a little automobile maintenance once a week or once a month (OK, many did not as well), but that is now a thing of the past. Before anyone knows what is wrong with a vehicle, they have to plug it in.

If you go to a main dealer, that knowledge will go into the company’s database to help it create a better car next time (or maybe they will use the data to make certain that it breaks down earlier next time – planned obsolescence).

The purpose here is that if you do not have an inkling of what computers can do or indeed are doing, you will be left behind, standing incredulously in the past asking yourself what happened to your old life. The easiest manner to find out what computers can do is to start working with computers on a conscious level.

There is just one problem with this piece though and that is that because you are reading it on line, I am talking to someone who is already working with computers. Never mind, I tried.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on a number of topics, but is now involved with the wireless broadband router. If you would like to know more, please visit our website at Best Router For Gaming Online

RFID (radio frequency identification) chips or tags as they are better known are the size of the smallest coin in your pocket, but they can store huge amounts of data that can be manipulated in methods that can do incredible things.

For example, RFID tags are in the majority of office identity tags and in some passports, allowing the holder to pass through security quickly while keeping the building or the country secure.

They are a modern version of the bar code. Remember before bar codes and bar code readers? When a shop keeper had to type prices into the cash register, correct mistakes and look up prices that they could not remember? People do not have any time for that anymore.

It is OK at the newsagents, but imagine a teenager typing in your two trolleys of weekly shopping at the supermarket every Saturday. You would still be there on Sunday! Superstores have thousands of articles and dozens of special offers – no-one could remember that lot.

No-one can, but bar codes make it straightforward and so do RFID tags. Bar codes work well, but they have to be seen to be read. RFID tags emit their information on a unique frequency which can be read out of line of sight. In other words, an RFID scanner does not have to be able to see the tag to read it.

The scanner can read what is in your trolley without you having to unload it and as you pass by that scanner and pay for your things, they are subtracted from stock immediately so that the warehouse manger can see what people are buying and what nobody wishes to buy. So, if one brand of cat food sells better than another, the manager will see that on the computer print-out and buy more of that make, thus keeping more people happy.

This use of RFID in stock control or asset management to give it its more official title, can translate itself into other uses too. An RFID tag can be put under your cat’s fur or in its collar so that you can locate him if he gets lost. The police and the wardens scan stray animals for a tag as part of their routine these days. Consevationists have been doing this with wild elephants, big cats and other endangered animals for years. Now you can have it done with your pets as well.

Company cars, as assets of the firm, often carry RFID tags and you can have one placed in your car to aid recovery if it is stolen. Baggage handlers at airports or bus terminals can (and do) use them to prevent mislaying luggage.

The US government insists that RFID tags be used on all vehicles carrying ammunition or dangerous substances and have done for almost ten years. The US military is in fact the principal user of these tags in the world. RFID tags are used to track military assets such as weapons, battle tanks, fuel, containers, artillery, you name it.

Some people are anxious about RFID technology. Where is the line between their convenience and their personal information? For instance, they do not like getting junk emails from people that have been able to trace the purchases they made with their credit cards.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on quite a few topics, but is currently involved with the RFID asset tracking. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Active RFID Management.

RFID (radio frequency identification) chips or tags as they are better known are as big as the smallest coin in your purse, but they can hold huge amounts of information that can be used in ways that can do incredible things.

For instance, RFID tags are in the majority of office identity tags and in a few passports, enabling the holder to pass through security quickly while keeping the building or the country secure.

They are a modern version of the bar code. Remember before bar codes and bar code readers? When a shop keeper had to key prices into the cash register, correct errors and look up prices that they could not remember? People do not have any time for that anymore.

It is OK at the newsagents, but imagine a teenager typing in your two trolleys of weekly shopping at the supermarket every Saturday. You would still be there on Sunday! Superstores have thousands of articles and dozens of special offers – no-one could remember that lot.

No-one can, but bar codes make it straightforward and so do RFID tags. Bar codes work well, but they have to be seen to be read. RFID tags send out their information on a unique frequency which can be read out of line of sight. In other words, an RFID scanner does not need to see the tag to read it.

The scanner can see what is in your trolley without you having to unload it and as you pass by that scanner and pay for your things, they are deducted from stock straight away so that the warehouse manger can see what people are buying and what nobody wants to buy. So, if one brand of cat food is selling better than another, the manager will see that on the computer print-out and buy more of that make, thus keeping more people happy.

This use of RFID in inventory control or asset management to give it its more official title, can translate itself into other uses too. An RFID tag can be placed under your cat’s fur or in its collar so that you can find him if he gets lost. The police and the wardens scan stray animals for a tag as part of their routine these days. Zoologists have been doing this with wild elephants, big cats and other endangered species for years. Now you can have it done with your pets also.

Company vehicles, as assets of the business, often carry RFID tags and you can have one placed in your car to aid recovery if it is stolen. Baggage handlers at airports or bus terminals can (and do) use them to avoid lost luggage.

The US government insists that RFID tags be placed on all vehicles carrying ammunition or hazardous substances and have done for nearly ten years. The US military is in fact the principal user of these tags in the world. RFID tags are used to track military assets such as armaments, battle tanks, fuel, containers, artillery, you name it.

Some people worry about RFID technology. Where is the line between their convenience and their personal information? For example, they do not like getting junk emails from people that have been able to trace the purchases they made with their credit cards.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on quite a few topics, but is now concerned with the RFID asset tracking. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Active RFID Management.

RFID is the recognized acronym for Radio Frequency IDentification. The basis of RFID technology is that every RFID chip or tag is capable of emitting a radio signal on a frequency wholly unique to itself.

Therefore, every RFID tag must have its own unique frequency and the RFID tag readers have be sensitive enough to be able to differentiate between frequencies that are only a very tiny bit different from its neighbouring tags. The disparity can be microscopic.

Therefore, the technology needs to be sensitive and discriminating, but not fragile, because the equipment has to be used on the shop floor and by people who are often in a hurry and in weather that may be inclement.

In order for RFID to work, you have to have a tag, which is an smart kind of bar code and a radio receiver, often called a (tag) reader. However, whereas a bar code can only hold a small amount of data and the bar code reader has to be pointed at it, an RFID tag can store much more information and can be read from a hundred yards or more – even out of line of sight.

Passive tags will only reveal their details when asked to by a reader, whereas an active tag is constantly relaying its information. Obviously, active RFID tags are more costly than passive tags, because they require a long life battery.

These tags can be utilized to track goods from the moment they leave the manufacturer of the items they describe to the in-bay of the vendor. The tags can then be up-dated or renewed and put in the warehouse. Once there, RFID readers can keep management up to date about what goods are where and if the sell-by-date is approaching.

This has ramifications for the amount of stock that a company has to hold, the quantity of goods sold cheap because the sell-by-date is too near and for theft, all of which should increase company profits more than paying for the cost of the tags, the readers, the printers and the software.

At the click of a mouse, managers will be able to read how much inventory they have in real time and if this is all connected to the checkout cash registers, which are the most and least profitable articles. This makes reordering simple . Easy to the point of automation. For example, when supplies of the top ten percent of the best selling products falls below 1,000 order 10,000 more. Automatically, no questions asked.

RFID has many other uses as well. The ideas outlined above can be applied to farm animals, a call centre’s computers, a fleet of commercial vehicles, an inventory of domestic items, your pets, your car and even your garden furniture. Some individuals who work over a boundary are even having them placed under their skin so that they do not have to wait at customs.

And bear in mind that criminals on early discharge are also tagged. It is the same technology.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on quite a few topics, but is now involved with the RFID asset management. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Active RFID Management.

In order to illustrate how RFID tags can really influence the fortunes of a company for the better, we shall take a look at a theoretical case below. Let us take the example of a furniture maker that specializes in the supply furniture to a hotel group.

This may sound like an example with no relevance to typical small businesses, but in fact, hotel chains are awfully choosy and have no loyalty, so if you can satisfy these people, you can please anyone.

The principal requirements of the hotel chain are that orders are complete and on time, the quality of the supplier’s goods has already been considered to be sufficient by means of enforced ISO 9000 quality control and factory visits.

The hotel furniture manufacturer decides to introduce passive RFID tags to follow its items from the point of manufacture to the point of delivery, that is the hotel or its storage area.

Under previous conditions the producer had employed a few people to walk around with bar code readers and clip boards carrying out quality control and tracking the fulfillment of orders.

The problem was that the system was still subject to human error and items still went missing, which lead to management compensating by over manufacturing and over stocking ‘just in case’.

That is a common enough phenomenon., but the difficulties are multiplied when you think of all the separate articles of furniture that are implicated in a hotel room, bathroom or lobby and if they are stored in a 200,000 square foot warehouse. Things get lost, forklift drivers make errors, people forget to fill in stock forms, get sick and take vacations.

In short, administrating a warehouse like this is a nightmare with too much stress on key employees. It sometimes leads to imperfect deliveries or worse, incomplete supply tickets. Sometimes the order might be complete but the hotel would think it was not because the delivery ticket was wrong.

If this company were to initiate RFID asset control they could affix an RFID tag to completed sticks of furniture. The tag would say where it is, what it is, whom it is for, when it has to be delivered and what else makes up part of the order. The tag is being read continuously by the warehouse’s RFID readers forewarning when orders are running late or are still incomplete.

Not only that but the tag can say what else has to be made and whether the object itself has passed quality control. It can also say which defects someone has found with it. In short, instead of a couple of people traipsing around the stockroom hoping that they have covered everything, you could have radio sensors reading every tag in a warehouse the size of a soccer pitch, reporting back to a central computer where the storehouse manager can have access to real time intelligence, not just the state of affairs at close of business the day before.

This should enhance the manager’s opportunity to manage, cut down on waste, guarantee complete orders handed over on time and so superior levels of customer satisfaction, which should lead to more repeat orders.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article writes on quite a few topics, but is currently involved with the RFID asset management. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Active RFID Management.