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Hello! I’m setting up a community coworking space and would like to have a simple tap in/tap out system so we can log who’s visiting the space, how long folks are staying, and how the space is being used.

 

My idea is to use NFC tags with unique webhook payload information stuck on cards that when tapped on a reader near the entrance, a webhook is fired into Airtable with the unique information about that tag. Within airtable we’d then set it to log the taps and workout if someone is ‘in’ or ‘out’ (with the ability to override of course).

 

My questions:

  • Does this seem like the best approach or would anyone suggest a different way to go about it? I’ve searched the forums and aside from some discussion around RFID I haven’t seen anyone talk about setting things up this way.
  • If so, what’s the best way to configure the webhook to fire when the NFC tag is tapped? We’ll be using an office PC with an external reader, and I’m not sure what the best route is to go from ‘tap’ to ‘webhook fired’.

Any feedback welcomed!! Thanks :) 

Hey ​@gelb!

I do not have much experience with NFC, however I always wanted to get involved. So this might be an interesting chance to follow your project closely lol.

As I see it:
1. You’ll need to choose what NFC reader you’ll be using -again, I do not know a lot about them but you should choose one which will allow for additional automation (e.g. calling a url)
2. You’ll want to use a third party automation tool such as Zapier, Make, or n8n (I would personally suggest n8n. You can see some differences here)
3. Set a trigger on your n8n automation for when a webhook call is received, and use the webhook url provided by n8n on your nfc reader software.
4. Get your n8n automation to do whatever needs to be done (e.g. push data to Airtable!!)

PLEASE do keep me posted on progress. I’d love to see how this goes.

Mike, Consultant @ Automatic Nation

​@gelb 

You may not be able to use Airtable’s webhook triggers, because they only support POST requests (instead of GET requests), and they also have several other limitations as well.

As ​@Mike_AutomaticN mentioned above, you’ll probably need to turn to 3rd-party tools for this.

In my personal opinion, the easiest, quickest, most powerful, and most inexpensive way of doing this is to use Make’s custom webhooks and Make’s custom webhook responses.

If you’ve never used Make before, I’ve assembled a bunch of Make training resources in this thread. For example, if you weren’t using an NFC tag, here is one of the ways that you could instantly trigger a Make automation from Airtable.

I also give live demonstrations of how to use Make in many of my Airtable podcast appearances. For example, in this video, I show how to use custom webhooks and custom webhook responses.

Hope this helps! If you’d like to hire the best Airtable consultant to help you with anything Airtable-related, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consultant — ScottWorld

Yep, concur with Scott and Mike that you’ll probably need an outside automation tool to act as an intermediary, and I’m also fascinated with how this implementation goes! If you solve it in Airtable def report back with here or on the builder’s board. 

I myself would probably vote Make over n8n, but Make’s a bit easier for the no-code crowd (which I count myself among). If you’re more technically inclined then n8n might be more your speed 🤷‍♂️

Regardless, super interested in how it works out!

Yeah, I know that ​@Mike_AutomaticN is a fan of n8n, but Make is still my favorite. I tried using n8n, but I personally found Make easier to use. Maybe I’ll go back and re-explore n8n in the future at some point.

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