After two weeks of working on the project, we realized that our project might be too complex to complete in the given time frame. In order to make the project more manageable, we proposed that the criminal database portion of the project be dropped. This was decide upon because the two main functionalities of the project, the fingerprint scanner and the SD card reader/sound production, have been taking a considerable amount of time thus far and still need large amounts of addition effort to complete. In addition, we could run into difficult down the road with transferring and comparing fingerprint files on the PIC as the details of this have not yet been worked out. Instead, we’d like to have the fingerprint scanner handle all fingerprint comparisons for the time being. This way, the focus of the project could be redirected to the two main elements. The terms of the project were renegotiated with the professor, and he accepted the exclusion of the criminal database.

I attempted to set up UART communication with the fingerprint scanner. This is being done with the aid of a pre-made code on GitHut in C++ for an Arduino. According to the fingerprint scanner datasheet, the scanner takes 12 bytes of data for every command packet, so twelve bytes are sent from the PIC to the fingerprint scanner per action. It has been verified on the scope that this data is being transmitted correctly. At the moment, the fingerprint scanner is having trouble receiving the data. The signal, for some reason, is being pulled down when the TX from the PIC is pulled into the RX of the fingerprint scanner. It was thought that the fingerprint scanner needed more power, but after supplying 5V to the power supply of the scanner instead of 3.3V, it was clear that this was not the case. Further troubling shooting will be completed in lab.

Plans for this coming week include getting the fingerprint scanner to communicate properly and creating methods to carry out the necessary communications between the PIC and fingerprint scanner.