First, I want to thank our IT Systems Administrator, Nate Saffle, for spear heading the advancement of our Fellowship One iPad check-in here at The Ark Church.
At our church we have designated check-in areas throughout the building. At each area we have 1-2 self check-in computers (with touch screens and “Ark Pass” scanners) plus at least 1 assisted with a single volunteer to manage the 3 computers. Plus throughout our campus we have mobile check-in stations that are a single computer/screen/printer/scanner on wheels. These are used to support the heavy traffic areas of our building and are moved around based on the day of week and service.
Elementary Check-In Station Area
With the addition of
iPad check-in plus the ability to select almost any printer from the
Fellowship One application we now are able to equip “roamers” to monitor the length of our lines and then offer relief.
iPad Screenshot with Printer Selection in Fellowship One
This solution is not a check-in station replacement. For our campus, forming lines and having established check-in stations works well with our architecture. And to have selectable printers, we rely on the existing check-in stations and the printers attached to them.
2. This solution still relies on a Windows-based machine. This is not a Mac version or iOS version of the check-in software. We have taken the existing iPad Check-in “recipe” and have implemented it in more a server format.
3. This explanation assumes that you are reading this with some IT experience or have capable IT staff that will assist. We can not go into every single detail of the setup, it would simply take too much time and every network is setup differently. We can only show an overview of what we did and let you adapt it to your network.
4. The iPad and iPad Check-in Server must be on the same IP subnet. If they are on different subnets the connection will not function. If you’re not sure if they are, contact your IT or Technical staff.
Now, let’s look at the details of how we did it.
We used the following item for setup:
1. Windows Server 2003 machine with Terminal Services Licensing. (Bear in mind that it has to have the Terminal Services Licensing component. If you do not have this you will be limited to 2 concurrent connections i.e. only 2 iPads at a time to use for checkin)
2. iPad with a remote desktop app installed (We’ve used iRDesktop and WinAdmin and both work pretty well)
3. Multiple Windows-based check-in stations with Printer sharing enabled and sharing the Zebra Printer attached
First make sure your Windows Server 2003 machine has a static IP. Then set up Terminal Services licensing to allow unlimited concurrent connections and set up the machine with local profiles named iPad1 – iPad5. Edit these accounts to look exactly the same with all the shared printers added.
Next, download the remote desktop app of your choice to your iPad. Once downloaded, set up a connection to your iPad Check-in Server.
iPad Remote Desktop App Setup
Be sure to test the connection to make sure you can connect. If you are able to log in and see the Windows desktop, your connection is working.
Keep in mind your check-in server needs to be wired. Fellowship One strongly recommends to use wired checkin stations due to the need for the check-in stations to connect to the internet. Wireless connections can be finicky and using a wireless device to interface with another wireless device just gives too many points of failure. Therefore if you attempt this with a wireless Windows Server, you will have issues.
Once setup, the process for checkin is simple:
1. Connect to the iPad Check-in Server
2. Run Fellowship One Check-in and enter the Activity or Super Check-in Code
3. In the Menu, hit the “Select Default Printer” button.
4. Choose the Printer of your choice
5. Begin Assisted Check-in
