An electronic gate system that monitors staff attendance and controls access is developed in this paper. This is because an electronic gate system is one of the means to curb staff inherent lateness to work and also control access within the vicinity. The system recognizes when a staff resumes or leaves before the stipulated time; this enables it to detect when a staff default. Facial recognition technology based on template matching with Open CV library is used for identification. This is developed into a standalone software application using C# (C sharp) programming language and an SQL (Structured Query Language) server database for storing data of valid users. Incremental software model is employed in developing the software. Access control functionality is also achieved by integrating an Atmega328 microcontroller mounted on an Arduino Uno board, a load cell and solenoid locks. High identification accuracy and a fast response time has been achieved when 10 staff, 5 visitors and 3 strangers were incorporated to test the system. The proposed system seeks to discourage lateness to work by including a penalization system for defaulting staff members and ensures this is done transparently to avoid litigations. More so, it enhances the security of any organization where it is installed since it will only grant access to legitimate users.
Keywords: access control, arduino atmega328 microcontroller, attendance monitoring, biometrics, facial recognition, payroll management
