[Inpycon] On using QR codes for sponsor-participant contact exchange.

[Haris Ibrahim K. V.]

Ladies and gentlemen,

During the last offline volunteers meetup, we discussed about
alternatives that we could use for contact exchange between the
sponsors and participants.

We had using Bar code readers in mind. Sayan and I took it up.

In between research, Praseetha suggested using QR codes for this
purpose. We investigated on that end and here are the observations.

Create QR codes for each registered participant before hand using this
API http://goqr.me/api/. Put them sorted alphabetically and hand it
over to the participants during registration. Printing it during
registration is a no-no. Tons of things that could go wrong.

Have a tablet (labelled with sponsor name) at every sponsor stall with
QR code app installed. The app is called QR Droid. It scans and stores
the information within a database. The sponsor can see the history at
any time they choose to. After the event, the app allows you to export
the data as a CSV. We'll have to write a CSV parser to parse the data
and send it to the respective sponsors.

The API allows 10k requests per day. So we're good there. This
approach will have the side effect of participants being able to
exchange contact info. Guess that is good side effect to have.

This approach requires neither a centralized server nor an Internet
connection. The Internet is usually the main problem in these
scenarios. Hence, we avoid that.

Sayan tested the API and the app. It seems to be working as expected.

We would like to hear your thoughts. With the exception of Murphy
hanging around PyCon India as an uninvited guest, unless there is
something that could obviously go wrong with this approach, it seems
reasonable to implement.

Oh, as for the Bar code reader, bar codes can only store numbers. Then
we again hit the problem of having a centralized server where we can
look up the details of the corresponding number.

Cheers,

-- 
Haris Ibrahim K. V.
http://sosaysharis.wordpress.com
@harisibrahimkv