It
happened again yesterday. We were talking about a new project.
The manufacturer that we wanted to use did not have, as part
of their standard offering, a feature of door control that we
would need. The site has several existing motorized revolving
doors that are access controlled. The clean antipassback operation
of these doors is critical to the success of the access control
design. How should we proceed?
A concept has been forming for several years now
that will allow greater flexibility for systems, simplicity
of the setup programming, and a more realistic approach to the
financial aspects of modifying the microcode that makes an access
control door function. One size does not fit all
in terms of the doors that are programmed into an access control
system. The manufacturers continue to present reader or door
screens with lots of options, switches, and relationships, and
still we often need more to satisfy a clean installation. Because
there were many different styles of airport jetway doors implemented
during the big FAR107.14 days, many of the manufacturers created
one or more separate subprograms called jetway doors. That is
an example of a door object. Why not design the systems from
the ground up with door objects?
The access control industry is not properly positioned
to meet the customer needs for door operations. Even with some
of the largest manufacturers, we have waited years for them
to include a function that will allow us to lower the false
alarm count from specific door applications. This is not because
these manufacturers don’t see the use or the need for the
requests. It is because every piece of software that is written
into the systems is a business decision that must be weighed
against other priorities. And, it is not easy to change the
"one size fits all" code for a single case without
affecting all of the other applications that are already installed.
This article presents a future concept, not a
fait accompli. Some manufacturers are close to having door objects.
Let’s get the access control industry out of the microcode
business, at least in terms of how a door operates. It is clear
that the industry does not make a profit on that portion of
their enterprise, a fact that is probably the driving factor
in the intransigence of door operation changes. Most of the
industry will be designing with some form of door objects soon,
simply because the economic case is so strong. Implementation
of this concept will allow for almost infinite flexibility while
not being constrained by legacy code and the "one size
fits all" constraints. To put all of this in perspective,
let’s look at a short history of the industry.
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