Intelli-Fridge

• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2047/d20000832

Inventory management is a term that has long since been used in industrial settings. In its simplest form, it is a process of materials control whereby goods can be tracked in terms of location and quantity. Warehouses commonly deal with large amounts of materials that are of a varying nature, and strict records must be kept in some sort of database to ensure on-time and accurate shipment. For years, this process was done by hand, whereby items would be periodically counted and records would be updated, but in 1969, a new technology was introduced that would change inventory management forever, this technology was Radio Frequency Identification (RFID). RFID allowed items to be tagged with a transponder that would be readable remotely by a receiver. But why should RFID be limited in its use to the industrial environment? Why can't an average person keep control of their inventory in a similar way? Why can't a system like this keep track of one thing that exists in constantly changing amounts in every house in the world? Of course, this is referring to the food in one's refrigerator. Our capstone group has modified a standard refrigerator so that it can keep an inventory of its contents. This refrigerator uses RFID technology similar to that which is currently used by companies around the world to keep track of their own inventory. Food items can be tagged and placed in the refrigerator. The signal from the tag is then received by an antenna, and the signal is then processed by integrated computer software that we designed to interface with a database that we have compiled. We have named our product the Intelli-Fridge.