Parents worry about not being able to control what their kids eat at school. Kids often buy sugary snacks and drinks, which can lead to unhealthy eating habits. Also, it's hard to make sure that kids with allergies don't eat foods that might be bad for them. On top of that, kids might not know how to manage their money well and end up spending too much.
The project tries to solve these problems with a system that allows parents to manage the options of snacks shown to their kids, and a vending machine to distribute these snacks.
The mobile application will enable parents to establish daily limits on specific snacks and choose which ones will be accessible for their children via the vending machine. This guarantees that parents maintain active control over their children's food selections.
The vending machine will be equipped NFC reader to facilitate student authentication. Once authenticated, they can choose from the available snacks, which have been previously determined by parents through the app.
Embedded System (Vending Machine)
The vending machine will identify the student using an NFC tag and a selection of the correct image, used as 2-factor authentication. The selected snack options will appear on the screen, and the user will be able to select the specific snack. After that, if the student has enough credit to buy the snack, the machine will provide it using the motion system.
The motion system consists of a stepper motor that will be moved by two other stepper motors to the selected product location. Then it will couple to the dispenser and provide the product.
App for parents
The app will be responsible for:
Cloud Server
The Cloud Server will handle database communication and provide an API to serve the required data to the Vending Machine and the App.
