Articles by Karyn Hodgson

Like every aspect of security, turnstile technology has gotten smarter over the years. The turnstiles you see in transit facilities are not the same as those high-end office buildings. The introduction of optical turnstiles changed that. But what has changed recently with optical turnstiles, and where is that technology headed?

The utility environment is challenging in many ways. Brent Franklin, president, Unlimited Technology Inc., Chester Springs, Pa., sums it up appropriately when he says, “Utilities are often located in the middle of some of the worst environments and applications you can possibly imagine. They are in the middle of a transformer field or on the side of a rocky hill. They absolutely have a lot more inherent risk than a normal office building.”

In an industry where technology is king and the latest and greatest in access control can do amazingly sophisticated things, it is somewhat ironic that one of the most complicated and controversial pieces of equipment to install is a lock — a magnetic lock, to be specific. The issues surrounding this relatively simple piece of hardware can get so messy that some dealers and integrators elect to stay away from installing it at all.

Designing an access control system often starts with the reader technology. But in some environments, that is the least of your concerns. Harsh environments can mean anything from extreme temperature (hot or cold), to dusty, dirty, gaseous, chemical and beyond. And while cards and readers may work just fine in those conditions, that is anything but a given. There are far more things to consider in the design of systems for these special circumstances.

Not too long ago, video storage meant wading through hours and hours of VHS tapes to find relevant video, worrying about tapes wearing out and providing the large amounts of physical space requirements for a facility’s storage needs.

For many years telephone entry and intercom systems have been staid and stable systems that really didn’t change much functionally over time. But as with the consumer world, technology has advanced at lightning speed in recent years — bringing with it game-changing capabilities.

Enterprise-level access control projects are just like any other access installation only larger, right? Wrong. Playing on the enterprise field requires a whole new level of skills, training, planning and follow-through to be profitable. The stakes are higher, not only for the integrator, but for the end user as well.

In a less-than-stellar economy such as the one the U.S. and the world have been experiencing for the past few years, it can be increasingly difficult for businesses to navigate with agility and foresight in order to stay on a path of growth. As security companies look to increase their business (let’s face it, that is everyone’s goal, irrespective of the economy), one of the best ways to do that is to stay abreast of the financial and business side of the security industry.

For the past decade or more, talk of “multi-technology” (multi-tech) readers has been about transitions (long or short) between one technology and another. First it was from magnetic stripe to proximity, then from proximity to smart cards. Today’s readers, however, stand that idea on its head.