My guess is that this is necessary because of the orientation of the tag. It will most likely be lying flat inder the skin and therefore in the worst possible orietation for the reader. I would think if you have a coil around the cat flap, your distance may be much higher.
Meindert
No, it's usually an MFID tag. Requires close proximity because it operates as the secondary coil in an imaginary air-cored transformer. The reader puts a carrier frequency into the primary winding, which powers the tag through induction. The tag modulates an ID code onto the secondary winding, which changes the current drawn by the primary. Microchip publishes some good app notes on the topic.
RFID systems fall into three categories, distinguished by operational frequency. The long-range systems used on train cars, shipping containers etc. operate in the n-GHz band. Long range, expensive, performance greatly affected by atmospheric conditions. The types used for animal chipping are much lower-frequency and have an effective range of just a couple of centimeters.
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Walmart in the US is going to require all suppliers to have them in their goods when manufactured or for small items in the packaging.
In clothing it is sown into the lining.
(see gilette stories that have been in the news gilette in UK has fitted RFID tags in all their products as part of a test)
Looks like the retail chains here in Australia atre going to go the same way. Except possibly you will have to buy the tags from the store as they will implement their own system.
For cats and dogs here they all have to be microchipped. Chip is inserted with a "large" needle.
Alex
Here's the link to Flo Control:
You could, perhaps, build something similar based on this hardware, using custom software:
Tanya
Teach the cat to pull a lever or push a button.
Cats are officially untrainable animals, which is why it's OK for Miss Kitty to scratch a judge's face off at a cat show, but if Mr. Woofles (dog) so much as snarls or takes a quiet leak on the floor, he's disqualified.
Also, many other animals are very good at learning those kinds of operations - squirrels being an excellent example.
I had a cat that would go in the bathroom, close the door, crap in the toilet, hop on the sink and then use its paws to open the door. Cats are plenty smart enough to be trained, they just don't want to give up control.
Whether a squirrel or raccoon would be able to figure out how to open the door..... I suppose that could be a problem. Animals are pretty smart, and here we are, on the embedded group, talking about embedding electronics into animals.
I've been wondering what kinds of biometrics one might use to identify an animal, other than image or shape recognition. Maybe the weight of the cat?
An RF tag hanging from its neck seems to me to be the obvious solution, however, there are a thousand ways to in a cat.
Merry xmas, by the way, if you celebrate the holiday. We do Chanukah over here.
Mike
Cats can learn to pull levers to open doors. What they probably can't learn to do is punch in a six digit pin that no other cat can guess (no word numbers like 'feedme').
Why not voice(meow) recognition ? or a combination of things
stand on sensor pad(weight), hold head or collar next to rfid or microchip reciever/sensor and meow and push button
Taking it to extemes have a challenge i.e. when cat stands on sensor pad or load cell, speaker emits a sound / tone / meow etc and cat has to respond with "special" meow
To get a good recording of a let me in meow for analysis, just sit a mic behind the mesh/screen door and put cat out when it would usually be inside(cooler winter evening would work well) and start recording.
Alex
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