Communality
Access control for South African gated estates.
Communality is a multi-tenant cloud access-control platform for South African gated estates. The cloud is the authority: it issues access credentials, holds each estate's own security secret, and owns the configuration, the entitlements and the audit trail. The gate device at the boom is the enforcer and a client of that cloud.
Communality is in active build ahead of its first estate onboarding. There is no public sign-up yet, and the surfaces below are reached by invitation.
What the platform does
- Issues the access codes an estate runs on: resident, visitor and delivery.
- Holds each estate's own security secret, so the server refuses one estate's codes at another's gate.
- Records every entry decision, grants and denials alike, with the method used.
- Carries the estate's configuration and entitlements out to its gate devices.
- Lets a household answer for a visitor who arrives without a code.
Common questions
- What is Communality?
- Communality is a multi-tenant cloud access-control platform for South African gated estates. One deployment serves many estates, and each estate's residents, codes, devices and entry records belong to that estate alone.
- Who uses Communality?
- Estate managers administer their estate: residents, addresses, access codes, regular visitors, deliveries, gate devices, configuration and the entry log. Residents use a phone app to show their own code and to grant access to a visitor or a delivery. The gate device validates whoever arrives at the boom.
- How does a visitor get in?
- A resident grants a code before the visit and shares it with the visitor. At the gate the visitor presents that code, the gate validates it, and the decision is written to the estate's entry log. Denials are recorded as well as grants, along with the method of entry.
- What happens if a visitor has no code?
- The visitor asks at the gate. The request goes to the household they are visiting, a resident with permission accepts or declines it, and the answer returns to the gate. The request and its outcome are recorded either way.
- Does the gate still work when it is offline?
- Yes, for a long code. A long code is 14 digits that carry their own proof, so the gate device checks it on the tablet itself, at the one gate it is bound to, and syncs what it decided once the link returns. Every other code, a resident's own among them, is checked by the server, so an offline gate cannot settle it and sends the arrival to the guard.
- Where does Communality operate?
- South Africa. It is built for the way South African gated estates control entry.