The Embedded Terminal Design And Development In Management Of University Laboratory Equipment

As the greater attention of higher education in our country, the amount of laboratory equipment of universities is increasing. Laboratory equipment has the characteristics of large amount, long-term using, and being used by many people, so the management of the laboratory work is particularly complicated and important. The management of laboratory equipment needs some necessary requirements such as working efficiency, the convenience to find the equipment, updating timely of the equipment information, and avoiding the loss of small instruments to ensure the normal teaching and scientific study.For solving the question of lower efficiency in the management of Laboratory equipment, this paper designed and developed a model of terminal to achieve some daily management work such as efficiently collecting information, managing the equipment and transmitting information, which based on embedded technology. This model of terminal posses the functions of equipment information input, querying, adding and deleting, modifying, and also has the ability to use WiFi for information transmission. In view of the inconvenient previous equipment management, which mostly rely on the computer software, this model of terminal has more advantages such as mobility, portability, and the outstanding performance of having small volume, operating very easy, having various functions, and using low power consumption etc.In this paper, the terminal including some function module, for example, RFID module, bar-code module, WiFi module and a touch screen module, which use Cortex-A8 as a control core in hardware. The function of each module has done as follows:1. The function of bar-code module is to scan the bar-code label on the equipment. If the equipment has not recorded, then the information of the equipment will be collected; If the equipment has already recorded, then the device will complete the function of querying, modifying, and deleting etc;2. The function of the RFID module identify the number of the laboratory room, establish an RFID card for each lab, which has record all of the information of the laboratory equipment inside. The establishment of RFID card makes it more convenient for the management of laboratory equipment, including some work of management such as search, reconciliation, and handover.3. The function of the WiFi module can be used anywhere at any time.It can send the equipment information via wireless network to a number of equipment manager’s computer for their viewing and managing;4. The role of touch screen module is to complete the function of human-computer interaction in the process of managing the information of the equipment.In the aspect of software, this paper has designed an embedded terminal, which based on operating system Linux, and the Qt platform be used for the system of human-computer interaction interface; Using the SQLite to develop the database of terminal, which used to store all of the equipment information; Using language C to complete software of each function module. The operation of software system is simple and friendly, which provides an efficient, standardized management way for the management of laboratory equipment.The test and actual application of system show that the terminal management system designed by this paper has advantages of functions various, using very easy. It uses the latest technology, which can solve the problems that exist in the management of university laboratory equipment effectively. It improves the efficiency of the laboratory management greatly, the application prospect of it will has a bright future.