Visitora

Self-hosted evacuation list for reception and site safety: one page naming everyone still inside — staff, contractors and visitors — derived from the sign-in log and kept on the device for when the network dies.

The problem it solves

A self-hosted visitor sign-in system for reception is rare: most are cloud SaaS billed monthly per location — Envoy being the best-known — and the visitor log lives on their servers. Visitora is the self-hosted version: $79 one-time, full PHP source, a front-desk sign-in screen any tablet browser can run, and a visitor log that stays on your own server.

A paper sign-in book fails at exactly one moment: the one it exists for. Somebody carries it outside, half the names are illegible, and nobody can say whether the contractor who arrived at eleven has left.

The cloud products that replace it charge per site, per month, and put the name of every person who visited you on somebody else's server. Then the wifi goes down during the fire drill and the tablet shows a spinner.

• A book that cannot be searched, cannot be counted, and cannot survive the walk to the car park
• Per-site monthly fees for what is a list of names and two timestamps
• Visitor personal data, including who they came to see, sitting in a jurisdiction you did not pick

Every feature

• One page, every visitor on site. Newest arrival first, with their host and their host phone number. One tap marks a person accounted for, and the tally reads on site / accounted for / still missing. It is the screen you open in the car park.
• It survives the network dying. The evacuation page is kept on the device. If the network is gone it still shows the list as of the last load — because the fire alarm and the router failing are not independent events.
• Paper beats both. A print muster sheet with a tick box per row, and a CSV, are one click each. When the tablet is at 2% the sheet is already printed.
• The list and the log can never disagree. On site is not a column that could go stale — it is derived from the sign-in and sign-out entries themselves. There is no second source of truth to drift.
• Kiosk mode. A full-screen page for a tablet at reception: big targets, no admin chrome, and nothing a visitor can wander into. They sign themselves in and get a badge number. Their host is told by email, or in your team's chat channel, when you switch it on, and the screen says so only when it went. Reception prints the badge from the visit record in one click.
• Badges that come back. Numbers are handed out lowest-first from however many badges you own, and returned to the pool on sign-out. Sign out by badge number or by name, with a disambiguation step when more than one person matches.
• Site rules and pre-registration. Optional text a visitor accepts before signing in — safety rules, an NDA, a site induction — and a pre-registration link so an expected visitor arrives already on the list.
• Everyone on the roll call. Staff tap in and out at the kiosk with a personal code, or from their phone. The evacuation list shows staff, contractors and visitors, with one tally. Presence only: no timesheets.
• The host hears about it where the team is. Arrivals posted to Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat or Discord, as well as the host's email.
• Contractors apart. Visitors and contractors sign in as what they are, and the list keeps them apart.
• The roll call on your wardens' phones. A personal link each, no account; several wardens tick people off at once, and it keeps working when the network drops.
• Badges from any printer, with a sign-out QR. The kiosk prints the badge on whatever printer it uses; visitors sign out by scanning it as they leave.
• Watchlist. Reception is told when someone on it signs in; the visitor sees nothing different.
• Deliveries. Couriers sign parcels in at the kiosk; the recipient hears by email or chat, and reception tracks it until collected.
• Contractors sign their own document. Write an induction or permit-to-work summary once. Every contractor reads and accepts it at the kiosk, and the exact text is kept on their visit, beside the site rules.
• Every entrance covered. Name your entrances, put a kiosk at each, and every visit records the door it came in by. It shows on the roll call, in the exports and in the API.
• Keep staff names off the kiosk. Visitors and couriers type the name of the person they are here for instead of choosing from a list, and the thank-you screen names nobody.
• Updates from inside the app. The Updates page installs a new release with your license key: Ownware's signature is checked, a backup is taken first, and the app puts the previous version back by itself if the update is interrupted or the database step or start-up check of the new version fails. It never checks by itself.
• Backups by themselves. Automatic backups, an optional copy to S3-compatible storage you own, and a weekly check that the latest backup reads back. The Health page names anything that needs attention.
• A text when their visitor arrives. A host who asks for it gets a text when their visitor signs in at the kiosk, through your own SMS gateway: the visitor, their company and the badge, never the purpose of the visit. Every text ends with a stop link, and a daily cap keeps made-up sign-ins from becoming paid texts.
• Own It 4.0.1 — fixes and an up-to-date manual. For Visitora, 4.0.1 fixes an installer that had lost its styling, a rollback that a page opened during an update could stop and a command-line update that ended in an error after putting the previous version back. Its manual, FAQ and QUICKSTART now cover everything 4.0 added, including two Nginx rules that keep the data folder private. Your license covers it: press Check for updates on the Updates page, or download it from your order page.
• Own It 4.0.2 — the installer opens on every host. For Visitora, 4.0.2 fixes a fresh install on an Apache host: the one-page setup at /install/ looped back to itself and never opened, and now it opens. Your license covers it: press Check for updates on the Updates page, or download it from your order page.

Release notes in full

• Own It 4.1: a text when the visitor arrives. For Visitora, 4.1 adds a text to the host when their visitor signs in, through your own SMS gateway, for hosts who ask for it. An Extended license bought from October 4, 2026 covers up to ten client installations, one per client project: hand each one over to the client or host it for them, with the client's logo and colors from the app's branding settings. The API reference now shows how to connect Visitora to Zapier, Make or n8n, using its own webhooks and API key. Your license covers the update: press Check for updates on the Updates page, or download it from your order page.
• Own It 4.0: it updates and backs itself up. For Visitora, 4.0 means updates from inside the app: the Updates page checks for a new release with your license key, verifies Ownware's signature, takes a backup and puts the previous version back by itself if the update is interrupted or the database step or start-up check of the new version fails. A new install can start with a sample business and remove it in one click; backups run by themselves, with an optional offsite copy and a weekly check that the latest one reads back; and the Health page says whether the install is looking after itself.
• Own It 3.3: contractors sign their own document. For Visitora, 3.3 gives contractors their own document: an induction or permit-to-work summary that every contractor reads and accepts at the kiosk, with the exact text kept on their visit beside the site rules.
• Own It 3.2: everyone really means everyone. For Visitora, 3.2 put everyone on the fire roll call: staff tap in beside visitors and contractors, and wardens tick people off on their own phones. The host hears about arrivals where the team already talks, badges print on any printer with a sign-out QR, deliveries and a watchlist sit at reception, each entrance can have its own kiosk, and staff names can be kept off the screen.
• Own It 3.1: it writes to the people you serve. Visitora was built after the 3.1 wave. Its outbound path is the host notice: with email switched on, a visitor's host gets an email through your own SMTP, and the kiosk tells the visitor only when it went. Off until you switch it on.