Using Airtable forms to create a virtual queueing system

Today's challenge for #100 days of no code was to build a form for journal entries. I'm going to take this challege a little off road and instead build a prototype for a virtual queueing system using airtable based off of a similar prototype I drafted earlier this year.

This queueing system is ideal for a continuously moving queue in which participants exit the queue one at a time. I'm going to refer to the people in line as "participants" and I'm going to refer to the person managing the queue as the "operator"

While everything I created today can be accomplished with a simple airtable form, today's #100daysofnocode challenge encouraged me to use Tally to create a form today, so I used Tally to create stylish green form.

Now that each entry to the queue exists as a record in a database, I set up a filter in that base to display active participants in the queue only. This is a filter that tells airtable to view only records in which "Exit Queue" is unchecked, which means checking that box removes a participant from the queue.

The "page customer" field exists to trigger an automation via Zapier that sends the participant an email (or text!) to let them know their turn is coming up. For now, this checkbox needs to be manually checked-but we can create automations later that check this box (and contact participants) whenever X happens (like an NFC tap) or once every Y minutes.

I also used Airtable's built in Interfaces tool (currently in beta) to create a dashboard that gives the operator a more stylish view of all of the participants in the queue

From the participant facing side:

• The participant can either self sign register for the queue via the Tally form
• This is a great opportunity to use NFC chips or QR codes!
• Posting a QR code that links to the sign up form makes it easy for participants to add themselves to the queue
• When a new participant is added to the queue, a zapier automation looks up the current average wait time and sends the participant a confirmation email.
• If I wanted to send SMS messages instead, I would connect zapier to justcall instead of gmail
• The participant receives an additional email when it's their turn to return to the operator and exit the queue

From the operator side:

• The operator can view a list of all participants currently in the queue, with the participants who entered the line first at the top
• The operator can manually page a participant by clicking the "page attendee" button
• Once an attendee has been paged, their record will highlight yellow and their record will be pinned to the top until they exit the queue