September 9-12, 2014, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan Electronic Ticket System Based on QR Code Identification Hou Tsan Lee, Yi-Wen Peng, Chun-Kai Huang, Huan-Yi Chou, Yu-Tzu Chen, Jhe-Wei You and Yu Wang Department of Information Technology Takming University of Science and Technology, Taipei, Taiwan (*E-mail: houtsan@takming.edu.tw) Abstract: The electronic ticket system for an indoor arena is proposed in this paper. The proposed ticket system includes both on-line and off-line ticket system based on QR code identification. On the other hand, the e-gate control at the entrance of the arena is also developed and implemented by an Arduino microprocessor with some proper elements. The electronic ticket system can provide a convenient way to book a seat of a show or concert and save the waste of paper ticket. With the help of fast developing of smartphone, user can receive the electronic ticket via Internet and show it on the display any place, any time. Moreover, the QR code ticket can be read by the reader mounted on the entrance gate to verify the ticket and control the gate. Some experimental results are also given to validate the effectiveness of the proposed system. Keywords: Information management system, QR Code, Electronic Ticket System 1. Introduction Traditional tickets are paper forms with printed information on them including date, price, seats no., and some special marks for identification. To avoid counterfeit, some techniques are adopted in the paper tickets e.g. laser mark, embedded metal line, barcode and so on. Although there are many techniques used to improve the disadvantages of paper ticket for a better performance to avoid counterfeit but there are still difficulties in verifying the effective ticket in a limited time. Therefore, the electronic ticket systems provide better solutions not only to avoid counterfeit but also to save the use of paper which is come from the trees. The electronics ticket systems are widely applied in many occasions nowadays such as NFC (near field coupling), RFID (radio frequency identification) system, barcode system, QR code system and so on. [1]-[6] Among these ticket systems, QR (quick response) code system is one of the most popular electronic ticket systems. The QR code has the advantage of low cost, available in smartphone and easy transfer via Internet or mobile phone system. That makes the electronic ticket system is feasible without paper ticket and it is available directly to link the information management system in the electronic ticket system. The proposed electronic ticket system develops a ticket system which based on QR code system from booking seats to controlling the e-gate at the entrance of the arena. Moreover, the smartphone is also introduced in the proposed system as the carrier of the QR code ticket for payment and identification of the entrance. The GPS (global positioning system), mobile communication system, NFC system and R code system are widely applied in the electronic ticket systems. [7]-[10] Furthermore, an e-gate (electronic gate) is also developed in the proposed system which is directly controlled by the information system during the QR ticket passing through the e-gate at the entrance. The proposed system provides a non-paper ticket system from booking the ticket to entering the arena. A composition of a booking system, a QR code generating system, a payment system and an e-gate control system has been developed and an information system with a database system is also developed to connect all systems. The experimental results will be provided to demonstrate the performance which is demonstrated based on the Taipei Arena. 2. System Structure First of all, the overall system is shown as the sketch in Fig.1. The users can surf on the Internet and connect to the electronic ticket system for online booking with their computers or smartphones. Fig.1: The sketch of the overall system In the booking systems, the flowchart of the online ticket system is proposed as shown in Fig.2. When the user want to attend to a certain program, first chooses the type of program after the user agreed to the terms of notification. The user then chooses the schedule of the program and selects the seats. The view from the selected seat will be also provided on the display as the seat being chosen as shown in Fig.3. 978-4-907764-45-6 PR0001/14 400 2014 SICE 1237
Online Ticket Orders Start Agree to Terms of Services Types Selection Choose Schedule, Seat, Ticket Type, Number of Tickets In both online booking or offline booking system, after chosing the ticket type, ticket amount and the seat of a specified performance, a ticket order will be produced automatically as show in Fig.5 on the webpage. The user have to cofirm the details of the tickets to activate the QR code generating system. Pay with Cash Enter Credit Card Number to Proceed Online Payment and Print Receipts Take Receipts to Exchange Official Tickets at Cashier Confirm and Print Billing Paper Pay The Billing at Cashier and Receive Official Tickets Fig.2: The flowchart of online electronic ticket system End Fig.5: The details of the ticket order Fig.3: The view from the chosen seat After the choice of seats, the proposed booking system provides two ways of payment, one is payment by credit card and the other is payment with cash. If the user chooses payment by credit card then follows the procedure from the system to complete the payment. Otherwise, the user has to print the billing paper out or save the QR code ticket within the smartphone and brings one of them to the cashier (or clerk of the convenience store) and pay the fee in a limited time period. Beside the online booking, the offline (on-site) booking system provides users to buy ticket directly at the arena, the flowchart of the offline booking system is shown in the Fig.4. After the confirmation made, an electronic ticket of QR code will be generated as shown in Fig.6 by the QR code generating system. The ticket system will ask the audience to fill in his/her email address or mobile phone number and then send the QR code electronic ticket to his/her email via Internet or message via mobile communication system. The electronic tickets are only effective after the payments had been completed. Which means a well designed information management system has already developed to communicate the online ticket system, the payment system and the e-gate system to monitor and record all the process. Fig.4: The flowchart of offline electronic ticket system Fig.6: The electronic ticket of QR code after oder 1238
Of course, there is a limited time period of completing the payment. Usually two hours for the payment is suitable. After the time limit, the electronic ticket will be cancelled. On the other hand, if the payment has been completed then the electronic ticket will be validated and become valid. Besides, a electronic notice is also given to inform the user that the electronic ticket is validated or cancelled. If the userchooses not to pay the fee by their credit card online but takes the QR code to the convienence store nearby and the QR code reader reads the ticket and shows the information of the ticket as shown in Fig.7. Fig.8: The payment requirement of QR ticket A notice of successful payment will be sent to the user (original booking person) after the payment is completed as shown in Fig.9. The QR code ticket will also be validated and become an effective ticket. The notification includes the details of the ticket, the user can save the information into their calendar or schedule list for further application. Fig.7: The QR ticket read by the clerk The QR code provides a connection between convienence store and the information management system of the electronic ticket system. After the QR code ticket being identfied by the information system, the system will ask for payment as shown in Fig.8 below to complete the booking process. The button pay pressed means the payment is completed and the information system of the electonic ticket system will validate the ticket. The display of the convenience store shows only the necessary information of the ticket. The information of the user such as email and telephone number are forbidden to public. Fig.9: tice of successful payment 1239
3. E-gate Control System The audiences can deposit the electronic tickets within their smartphones and then come to the e-gate at the entrance of the arena. The gate controll process is shown as the flowchart in Fig.10. When the QR code ticket is verified as an valid ticket, the e-gate will open and the LED panel will also show the direction of the seat to guide the audience quickly pass through the entrance area. On the other hand, the display will show the fault message to notice the audience of his/her ticket is unavailable as shown in Fig.11. Gate Control Flowchart Start Ticket Verification LED Panel Displays Seat Location LED Panel Displays Fault Messages Gate Controller Complete Fig.10: The flowchart of the e-gate control process Fig.12: The electrical circuit and the physical implementation of the e-gate 4. Conclusion Fig.11: The LED didplay of the e-gate The left part of Fig.11 shows the instruction for the user passing through the e-gate the seat s location is 100 meter straight then 50 meters right and the row/seat is 01-08. The right part of Fig.11 provides the instruction details of the last audience on the upper half of the LED display and the lower half for the audience passing through the e-gate whose ticket is unavailable. The physical e-gate controller is implemented by an Arduino microprocessor with a servo motor to control the gate. Fig.6 shows the electrical circuit and the physical implementation of the e-gate (a mini prototype). The Proposed electronic ticket system is developed with an information system to connect all the subsystems such as ticket booking system, seat selection system, QR code generating system, smartphones and e-gate control system via Internet and mobile communication system. All the systems flowcharts are well designed and verified by both simulation and experiments. The physical systems are also provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed system. Reference [1] Finzgar, L. and Trebar, M., Use of NFC and QR code identification in an electronic ticket system for public transport, Conference on 19th International Software, Telecommunications and Computer Networks (SoftCOM), 2011. 1240
[2] Damon Gura, Kevin O Shea, Arjuna Reddy and Micheline(Mich) Sabatte, QR Codes, Kellogg School, rthwestern University, March 11, 2011. [3] Siba Prasad Panda and R.K. Mahapatra, QR CODE:AN INNOVATIVE USE IN LIBRARY AND INFORMATION SCIENCE, VSRD International Journal of Computer Science & Information Technology, Vol.3,.4, 2013. [4] Mu Zhang, Dan Yao and Qian Zhou, The Application and Design of QR Code in Scenic Spot s eticketing System -A Case Study of Shenzhen Happy Valley, International Journal of Science and Technology, Vol.2,.12, 2012. [5] Man Mohan Swarup, etc., A QR Code Based Processing For Dynamic and Transparent Seat Allocation in Indian Railway, IJCSI International Journal of Computer Science Issues, Vol.9,.3, 2012. [6] Mehul Yadav, Sumedh Kurundkar, Anushka Barve and Mrugesh Verekar, A QR Code Based Processing for Dynamic and Transparent Seat Allocation, International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Vol.3,.10, 2013. [7] Neha Sandikar, Rane Dipti and Sachin Pandey, 2013 Android Railway Ticketing with GPS as Ticket Checker, NCNHIT 2013. [8] Mabel Vazquez-Briseno, etc., Using RFID/NFC and QR-Code in Mobile Phones to Link the Physical and the Digital World, Chap.12, Interactive Multimedia, INTECH, 2012. [9] Bhrat Patel and Jon Crowcroft, Ticket based service access for the mobile user, Proceedings of the 3rd annual ACM/IEEE international conference on Mobile computing and networking (MobiCom 97), 1997. [10] Valcourt, E., Robert, J.-M. and Beaulieu, F., Investigating mobile payment: supporting technologies, methods, and use, IEEE International Conference on Wireless And Mobile Computing, Networking And Communications (WiMob 2005), 2005. [11] Bernard Kolobara, Electronic Ticket and Check-in System for Indico Conferences,CERN openlab Summer Student Report, 2013. 1241