Cascade - Contactless Cafeteria Ordering System

A full-stack cafeteria management platform with contactless ordering, AI-powered face recognition attendance, food consumption analytics, and a dual-panel interface for customers and admins.

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The Problem

Manual cafeteria management is slow, error-prone, and resource-intensive. Paper-based ordering and attendance tracking leads to billing errors, food waste, and inability to make data-driven decisions. Post-COVID, contactless interaction became not just a convenience but a necessity.

Cascade automates the entire cafeteria lifecycle - from contactless ordering to AI-based attendance - giving managers real-time visibility into consumption, revenue, and operations.

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Features

Customer Portal

• Browse food menu by category with images and prices
• Search for specific food items
• Place orders with quantity selection - no physical contact required
• Receive auto-generated invoices on order confirmation
• Submit feedback on food and service

Admin Dashboard

• Real-time stats - total categories, food items, orders, and revenue generated
• Full CRUD operations for food items, categories, and admin accounts
• Order management with status tracking: Ordered → In Kitchen → Pickup Ready → Delivered / Order Collected / Cancelled
• Food collection delay monitoring
• Feedback management and analysis
• Meal planning across breakfast, lunch, and dinner including special events

AI-Based Face Recognition Attendance

• OpenCV Haar Cascade classifier for real-time face detection from webcam
• LBPH (Local Binary Pattern Histogram) face recognizer for student identification
• Trained on labeled face image datasets per student ID
• Attendance and food collection tracking logged directly to MySQL
• Supports penalty and refund decisions based on collection records

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System Architecture

Customer Browser
      |
   PHP Pages (index, foods, categories, order, invoice, contact)
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   MySQL Database (tbl_food, tbl_category, tbl_order)
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   Admin Panel (manage orders, food, categories, delays, feedback)

Attendance Module (separate)
      |
   OpenCV Webcam Feed
      |
   Haar Cascade Face Detection
      |
   LBPH Face Recognizer (trainingdata.yml)
      |
   MySQL (attendance + food collection records)

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Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Frontend	HTML5, CSS3
Backend	PHP (Procedural)
Database	MySQL (via mysqli)
Face Detection	OpenCV, Haar Cascade XML
Face Recognition	LBPH Face Recognizer (OpenCV)
CV Pipeline	Python, NumPy
Local Server	XAMPP (Apache + MySQL)

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Project Structure

Cascade/
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├── index.php                     # Customer homepage
├── foods.php                     # Full food menu
├── categories.php                # Browse by category
├── category-foods.php            # Foods within a category
├── food-search.php               # Search food items
├── order.php                     # Order form + DB insert
├── invoice.php                   # Order confirmation invoice
├── contact.php                   # Customer feedback form
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├── admin/
|   ├── index.php                 # Dashboard - counts + revenue
|   ├── manage-food.php           # View all food items
|   ├── add-food.php              # Add new food item
|   ├── update-food.php           # Edit food item
|   ├── delete-food.php           # Delete food item
|   ├── manage-category.php       # Category management
|   ├── manage-order.php          # Order status management
|   ├── manage-delay.php          # Food collection delay tracking
|   ├── manage-feedback.php       # Customer feedback review
|   ├── manage-admin.php          # Admin account management
|   └── login.php / logout.php    # Admin auth
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├── attendance/
|   ├── FaceRecognitionDatabase.ipynb   # Face detection + LBPH training
|   └── haarcascade_frontalface_default.xml
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├── config/
|   └── constants.php             # DB connection + site URL constants
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├── css/
|   ├── style.css                 # Customer portal styles
|   └── admin.css                 # Admin panel styles
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├── partials-front/               # Customer header + footer
├── Documents/                    # SRS, SDD, Project Pitch
└── LICENSE

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Getting Started

Prerequisites

• XAMPP (Apache + MySQL)
• PHP 7+
• Python 3 + OpenCV (for attendance module only)
• A text editor (VS Code, Sublime Text, etc.)

Setup

1. Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/deepti-96/Cascade-Contactless-Cafetaria-Ordering-System.git

2. Move to XAMPP web root

mv Cascade-Contactless-Cafetaria-Ordering-System /path/to/xampp/htdocs/Cascade

3. Import the database

• Open phpMyAdmin
• Create a new database named Cascade
• Import the SQL schema from Documents/

4. Configure the connection

Update config/constants.php if needed:

define('SITEURL', 'http://localhost/Cascade/');
define('LOCALHOST', 'localhost');
define('DB_USERNAME', 'root');
define('DB_PASSWORD', '');
define('DB_NAME', 'Cascade');

5. Start XAMPP and visit

http://localhost/Cascade/

Admin panel:

http://localhost/Cascade/admin/

Attendance Module Setup

pip install opencv-python numpy mysql-connector-python

Add student face images to attendance/users/<student_id>/ and run the notebook to train the LBPH model:

jupyter notebook attendance/FaceRecognitionDatabase.ipynb

The trained model is saved as trainingdata.yml and used for real-time recognition.

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Order Status Flow

Ordered → In Kitchen → Pickup Ready → Delivered / Order Collected
                                    → Cancelled

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Future Improvements

• Integration with college online portal and student ID system
• Credit/debit card payment gateway
• Mobile app for order tracking
• Predictive food demand forecasting using historical order data
• Push notifications for order status updates

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Documents

• Documents/SRS.pdf - Software Requirements Specification
• Documents/SDD.pdf - Software Design Document
• Documents/Project Pitch.pptx - Project presentation