Progress Report

Aakash Application Development Lab at IIT Mandi

By

Dr ARTI KASHYAP Faculty Advisor- AADL

INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, MANDI HIMACHAL PRADESH

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1. Introduction

Aakash Application Development Lab (AADL) at IIT Mandi started in August 1, 2012 with the

vision of developing informative and educational applications for Aakash tablets. This venture

provides an opportunity to develop educational applications for helping students in remote

locations as well as in developing many other social applications for helping the rural population

in the region.

This established Lab provided the developers with Aakash tablets for demonstration purpose as

well as all the tools, platform and expert assistance to develop useful applications for android

tablets.

1.1. Tablets testing:

Number of Tablets Received Date Comments

10 Oct 2012 Pre-installed software, no

major problem with the tablets

40 April 2013 Default language was

Chinese, many chargers did

not work and few tablets just

did not start

200 May 2013 Few tablets did not start up at

all and few became dead after

some time.

4 August 2013 Better compares to previous

ones in terms of touch screen,

performance wise, look wise.

1.2 Comments on Aakash tablets after testing:

IIT Mandi AADL team is quite satisfied with the tablets. Following are our observations:

Hardware:

The processor speed is quite good.

Applications run smoothly without slowing down.

The touch screen is good and at par with other tablets / phones in the market.

The problem encountered while using Aakash tablet is that sometimes it hangs. It appears

to be an operating system problem.

Battery backup is not good.

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Wi-Fi is ok.

Camera quality is not good.

Software (Pre-supplied Applications):

The applications currently on Aakash are all quite nice.

The C, C++ and Python programming environment are easy to use and have sufficient

features for students to practice programming.

Other applications like proximity (Video Lecture Player) are very useful too.

In addition to applications currently available, it was easy to install any new applications

on the tablet.

Number of not working Tablets: Currently near about 40 tablets are not working.

Few issues which came up with the tablet appear to be more with the second lot than with the

first one. Many of the tablets received had a broken Screen. Some chargers just stopped working

and the tablet started with the interface in Chinese rather than English.

1.3 Feedback of the workshop’s participants on Aakash tablets.

During the workshops all the participants were provided Aakash Tablet for hands on experience.

Based on the feedback of the participants following observations were made:

The device itself feels a bit like a toy compared to a laptop or other tablets available in

the market.

It should come with Bluetooth facility.

The build quality is fine.

The tablet feels good in hand- the grip is fine.

It should come with back camera.

The Speaker sound is too low.

Battery backup is not good.

The overall look is good.

1.4 Application Testing on Aakash tablet:

The developed applications were tested on the Aakash tablet based on the experience of the

application developers/users it was concluded that these tablets are very effective and useful, the

tablet is easy to use and handle, its audio quality is quite good and it can effectively support

small applications. However, some of the important issues that need to be addressed are:

Video quality is not good, hang regularly during video playing.

Crash or slow down during running heavy applications.

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Sometimes a touch screen is not performed well.

Can’t handle a couple of applications running together.

Tablet processing quite slow during running TTS (Hindi) engine.

Among all these mentioned issues the poor battery backup and crash/slow down during running

heavy applications are the most crucial points to be addressed. For example, we were not able to

complete MGNREGA survey on Aakash tablet successfully as the battery was getting discharged

within no time. Another major problem was faced during running My Doctor application as it

was contained TTS (Hindi) engine that is the heaviest part of the application and was not

effectively supported by present Aakash tablet configuration.

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2. Aakash Android Application Development

As a part of the activities in the AADL, many of the applications, i.e. social, educational and

gaming have developed for Aakash tablet.

Applications Download Link: http://uhl.iitmandi.ac.in/aadl/application.html

The following applications have been developed:

2.1. Social Application’s

2.1.1. My Doctor (Pregnancy Application)

Description:

Himachal Pradesh is a hilly area, around 91% population lives in villages. Transportation

facilities in these remote villages as well as the availability of medical facilities are a major issue.

Therefore imparting right information to the people in their respective location is the best

solution. Keeping them in view this My Doctor application is designed. It contains basic

information about handling various issues related to pregnancy and also suggest them when to

reach the doctor. Considering the local language constrains the contents of the whole application

is designed in Hindi language which make it more user friendly as well as easy to understand and

suits the need of the region. The major attractive thing in this application is Text-To-Speech

Engine in Hindi language which is beneficial for uneducated people.

Features:

Complete information on pregnancy.

Identify danger signs during pregnancy, birth, and after birth.

How to stay healthy during pregnancy.

Text-To-Speech Engine in Hindi language.

Access Count and Duration

Feedback:

To check practical feasibility of the developed application for Aakash Tablet in rural areas of

Himachal Pradesh a thorough survey was conducted in rural areas of distinct Mandi. The

feedback we received was very encouraging. In brief, the participants found this application very

easy to understand and user friendly. They also felt that the Aakash tablet will be very useful in

spreading the awareness in the field of education & health. They were satisfied with the amount

of information received from the application. The detailed status of feedback in the form of a bar

graph is shown below:

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Screen Shots:

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2.1.2. KisanVikas – an Arduino Android based solution for Indian Agriculture

Description:

Kisan Vikas is an android application, using ICT and promoting e-governance by

providing continuous information pertaining to agriculture like weather forecast, crop prices,

news, Government help lines, and an inventory database manager. The app wirelessly controls

a robot which can perform various operations like ploughing, seed sowing and watering

(Irrigation). The live video feed from an onboard camera is continuously visible onto the app for

better monitoring. It also connects to an Arduino based wireless sensor network (WSN)

comprising soil moisture, temperature sensors to control switching of water pumps for watering

small fields, irrigation over the Global System for Mobile communication (GSM) and Bluetooth

networks.

Features:

Hardware interface – wireless control over Bluetooth of a robot which can

a) Navigate

b) Plough

c) Sow seeds

d) Irrigate (Watering)

e) Stream live video from an on board camera onto the android phone

f) Communicate with ultrasonic and infrared sensors and display the status using

indicators – LCD, LEDs and buzzers.

Software interface – an android application which assists a farmer with continuous real time

information like:

a) Sign up using mobile number and a password.

b) Weather forecasts for 5 days with graphical trends

c) Daily Crop prices in Mandi (markets)

d) Daily news on global, national and regional levels on ~82 topics

e) Map of the field with continuous position monitoring of the user and robot.

Screenshot and note making to document the crop cycle.

f) Inventory manager to manage the assets and inventories of a farmer like harvested

crop, seeds and fertilizers, vehicles and equipment.

g) Helplines to the Krishi Vigyan Kendras (KVKs), Kisan Call Centers (KCCs).

h) Wireless control using a GSM shield over SMS for pumps using inputs from moisture

sensors.

i) Mode settings wherein parameters like plough angle (depth), seeding distance,

maximum robot speed, etc. are set.

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Screen Shots:

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2.1.3. MGNREGA Survey Form

Description:

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is an Indian law

that aims to guarantee the right to work and ensure livelihood security in rural areas by providing

at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose

adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. IIT Mandi is reviewing the impact of

MGNREGA and changes effected by the scheme in Mandi district by conducting a survey of

several Panchayats of the district. MGNREGA Survey form is useful application for the on field

survey on development under MGNREGA. This app provides many tabular fields to store the

details of people and its family of several Panchayats of the district which will be helpful for

conducting surveys.

Features:

Simple Interface

Easy to understand

Internal data storage

Screen Shots:

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2.1.4. Animal Husbandry

Description:

This application proposes to make animals care and management simple, useful and more

efficient. Through this app one can monitor the condition of animals simply and easily. The user

can also observe many of health problems or malnutrition reflected in the conformation of their

animals; observing these problems allows the user to monitor the effectiveness of treatments

over time. This app will provide assistance to livestock extension specialists and people

interested in the discipline of Animal Husbandry. Agricultural engineers, veterinarians,

architects, students, progressive farmers and anyone interested in the housing of animals should

find much to interest them in this app.

Features:

Identify and explain the causes and contributors to current problems in animal husbandry.

Outlines disease information necessary to engage with current problems: animal welfare,

food and health.

Screen Shots:

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2.2 Educational Applications

2.2.1. Data Structure Simulation

Description:-

It is a dedicated application towards Programming algorithms such as data structures and graphs.

This app provides a great understanding of various data structures concepts. As the Subject Data

Structures is one of the most important topic in Computer Science and it is also difficult to

understand. Therefore, this app plays a vital role that gives a clear understanding of concepts

used in data structures. This application provides simulation in order to understand some basic

concepts or operations like Stack, Queue, Linked List, Breadth First Search (BFS) and Depth

First Search (DFS). This app also provides the menu of operations described above, so that user

can select any option from the menu. All these options or modules works according to user

selection. The application provides visualization of concepts described above in terms of

simulation or 2D drawing. For example, for Stack operation, when a user enters number between

0 to 99 stacks of balls is obtained.

Features:

Easy to access and understand.

Provides theory of Data Structure concepts such as stack, Queue, Linked List, BFS, DFS.

Queue, Linked List, BFS, DFS operations, examples.

Algorithms

Provides simulation in order to understand some basic concepts or operations of data

structures.

Screen Shots:

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2.2.2. Easy Engineering

Description:

The App “Easy Engineering” plays a role of a handy pocket reference guide for students

stepping into engineering colleges, who need guidance on different topics of their engineering

courses. This app includes study material like Wikipedia study material, links to web resources,

to various books and offline NPTEL PDF material which would prove beneficial for the students

doing their undergraduate in electrical, computer science and mechanical engineering. The

interface is kept simple, categorized as per the streams. The app is designed to be user friendly -

simple navigation and flow of the application.

Features:

Easy navigation and categorization

Offline And Online Content

Topics oriented with respect to Btech student

Three Streams – Computer Science, Electrical and Mechanical

Wikipedia without internet

Book References

Offline NPTEL PDF content

Links to Online Resources

Screen Shots:

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2.2.3. Aakash Ayurveda

Description:

Ayurveda is used today as a common term for traditional Indian medicine. Ayurveda is a

complete medical system. It deals with health in all its aspects; physical health, mental balance,

spiritual well-being, social welfare, environmental considerations, dietary and lifestyle habits,

daily living trends, and seasonal variations in lifestyle, as well as treating and managing specific

diseases.

Aakash Ayurveda is a simple but useful Educational App that contains information about the

History of Ayurveda, Ayurvedic plants of Himalayan region like botanical names, vernacular

names of the plants and their medicinal properties, few Ayurvedic treatment techniques and a

quiz based on the Ayurveda. The goal of this application is to familiarize the user with traditional

Ayurvedic plants and their medicinal properties with Ayurvedic treatment technique.

Features:

Ayurveda History.

Information about Ayurvedic Plants of Himalayan region.

Image for each Plant.

Information about Ayurvedic Treatment Technique.

Integrated Quiz based on Ayurveda.

Screen Shots:

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2.2.4. E-Blackboard

Description:

E-Blackboard is a very simple paint application for all ages and one of the richest features

application. This application provides interface for free hand writing. This application is also

useful for children to learn how to draw objects, numbers and letters, etc. By using this

application, user can draw a creative art with our finger also can draw a picture smoothly by

different size brushes and various bright colors.

Features:

Easy to use and understand.

User can play random hand free drawings.

Different colors to choose

User can also edit gallery pictures with colors and save them

Change background color

Pencil / Eraser

Snapshots:

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2.2.5. Note Mania

Description:

Note Mania as the name suggests, is an application for the people who love to take notes of the

important issues around us. The notes give us an easy review of the topics that were discussed

long back.

Note Mania is an android application which not only gives a user the ability to have their own or

else’s hand written NOTES on an electronic instrument like a tablet but also supports the feature

of a reminder related to the assignments, etc. Note Mania gives us the flexibility to write the

notes on the notepad in the very same way as we were used to write the notes in our school time

in the copy. But here we don’t have to carry them everywhere.

Features:

Notes- create new notes, updating the note, changing the note title.

To-do List- creating new to-do list item, writing to it, saving, deleting, updating to-do

note etc.

Reminders- provide the facility to set reminders for the project / assignments for the alert.

Books- provides the facility to save the book's information and a link to the book that is

present on the tablet in some folder.

Screen Shots:

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2.2.6. MIPS Simulator

Description:

MIPS Simulator is an assembly language Simulator application, which is able to execute the

MIPS instructions. MIPS (Microprocessor without Interlocked Pipeline Stages) is a RISC

(Reduced Instruction Set Computer) instruction set architecture. It has three types of Instruction

formats - Register (R type), Immediate (I type), and Jump (J type).

Features:

Able to run the MIPS Instructions.

Support comments and blank lines in the code, to increase clarity of the program.

Contain some good MIPS program examples involving most of the instructions present

in MIPS.

Option to run the instructions step by step or all at a time.

Provide help containing all the supported Instructions, the available registers and tips to

use the simulator.

Provide an instantaneous view of the values of all the available registers at any time

during execution of the program.

Contain a response area where the status of execution or any error in the instructions

would be displayed.

Screen Shots:

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2.2.7. Operating System (AAOS)

Description:

AAOS (Android Application to learn OS) is an educational application that contains textual as

well as pictorial information covering important topics of the Operating System. The AAOS

provides information about introduction, types, examples, components as well as all the

installation steps for various operating systems like Ubuntu, Redhat, Fedora, Windows XP,

Windows 7 and Windows 8. One can easily learn the installation steps for the various operating

systems through AAOS as it contains all the pictorial representation of all the steps.

Features:

It is a very simple and easy to learn application.

No replication of data.

Provide details of various operating system concepts

Screen Shots:

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2.2.8. Data Structures Quiz

Description:

The data Structure quiz application has a wide variety of objective question from the various

sub-topics of data structure. The application has around 300 objective questions divided into

three levels and randomly they are selected from the database. Also the students can figure out

their mistakes at the end of the quiz where their marks as well as rating will be displayed. This

application is for all the students of computer science as well as other engineering branch

Features:

Handy application for engineering students.

Useful for developing data structure skills.

Covered various sub topics of data structure

Provide different levels and different sets of questions.

Screen Shots:

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2.3. Educational & Gaming Applications

2.3.1. HangMan

Description:

HangMan is a perfect pass time educational game for people especially children/ teens/ students

when they are bored. If you are bored in a lecture and want to pass time, HangMan is the game

every tablet must have. With an option of Playing against Human, there is an option to have your

own question encrypted and asked to your neighbor. The application has various categories to

choose from like Mechanical Engg, Electrical Engg, Computer Science (academic) and also

Movies, Countries and Cities (the fun part). Not only will one’s vocabulary increase, but also in

a fun Q-A type format. It involves a Question, which has been encrypted into dash and slashes,

to be correctly identified using alpha numeric inputs. For every wrong input, the Man in the

picture is gradually hanged. After 7 unsuccessful attempts, the man dies and your GAME is

OVER.

Features:

Multiple game modes

Multiple Levels

Self-explanatory

Various categories to choose

Screen Shots:

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2.3.2. Memorizer

Description:

Memorizer is a small application related to memory. In this application a few alphabets will be

displayed for a short duration one by one. The letters will not be visible after that duration. User

needs to remember those letters in the same order as they were displayed. After the letters are

gone, user needs to rewrite the letters in the same sequence. The level will be started again after

user permission. After each level the number of letters will increase, consequently making the

code difficult to remember.

Features:

Will test the memory of the user.

Concentration checks.

Interesting exercise of memory and concentration.

The exercise will help not only in academics, but also in other activities.

The user gets to select the starting level so that he hasn't required start the game always

with zero level.

Screen Shots:

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3. Student Training/ Workshops

As a first step, the self-motivated group of few students gave "Beginners workshop" to around 40

students for getting started with Android application development. After that competition about

the ideas for developing applications for Aakash was floated. Good ideas were selected and

students started working on the applications.

After receiving more tablets we organized a workshop for the Government Engineering College

in the neighborhood, called Jawahar Lal Nehru Govt Engineering College. Lots of hands on

practice were given to the students to give them a good feel of the android application

development as well as use of Aakash tablet.

To reach out to students in nearby private engineering colleges, few interns from Shoolini

University, Solan (HP) were taken and trained at IIT Mandi. Just to mention, Shoolini University

at Solan had received Aakash tablets from IIT Bombay and students had undergone the training

about how to use the tablet. One workshop on Interactive Android App Development Competent

use of the Aakash Tablet for the Shoolini University students was conducted in September, 2013

where trained interns of Shoolini university help AADL team from IIT Mandi to trained other

students. This workshop covered the all the topics of previous workshop and in addition to that,

some more advanced topics such as; JSON, XML and Ideology for app development were also

included this time. This workshop proved to be a very useful platform for the participated

students for understanding basic concepts of Android Development. Some of the participants

were really motivated and showed interest in developing new applications for Aakash Tablet.

Workshop for the youngest students of IIT Mandi, i.e. Fresher’s was conducted, to introduce the

Aakash project. They were shown Aakash tablet and were told about android development and

also gave a new idea about application development.

A few students from NITs who had an interest in Android application development, also have

got involved with AADL, IIT Mandi and working for applications on Aakash.

Workshop Details:

Workshop at Location Date No. of

Participants

Comments

"Android Development

Workshop for

Beginners” at IIT Mandi

August 06, 2012 40 Workshop covered various

aspects of app development,

such as Java programming,

XML designs and basic

designing of an application.

"Competent use of May 05, 2013 75 It was a very successful

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Aakash Tablet and

Android Development”

at IIT Mandi

workshop. It motivated many

participants for Android

development for Aakash tablet.

Interactive session at

NIT Jaipur

June 01, 2013 40 It encouraged Students to

develop apps for Aakash tablet.

“Freshmen Orientation

of Aakash Application

Development Lab” at IIT

Mandi

August 24, 2013 60 Workshop covered the basics

of android development and

also gave new ideas about

application development.

“Interactive Android

App Development

Competent use of

Aakash Tablet” at IIT

Mandi

September 01,

2013

70 Workshop covered more

advanced topics such as JSON,

XML and Ideology for app

development.

“An Introduction to

Android Application

Design and

Development” at IIT

Mandi

September 14,

2014

60 Workshop covered the basics

of android application

development.

“An Introduction to

Android Development &

Java” at IIT Mandi

October 01,

2014

45 Introduced to Android Studio

and the fundamentals of

Android Apps and the Java

programming language.

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Workshop Poster’s:

Workshop Image’s:

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4. AADL Mandi website:

The website has been developed for AADL Mandi is an attempt to make provide complete

details of IIT Mandi AADL activities. The AADL Mandi website is a collection of web pages,

images and other useful information related to AADL Mandi.

The working of the AADL Mandi Website is as follows:

The first page provides several links. The Home page contains several modules contains AADL

information, i.e. applications developed, conducted workshops, members, partners, contact. The

Application module provides information on application development under AADL Lab. The

workshop module contains the details of workshops conducted at IIT Mandi. The member’s

module provides details of members involved in AADL Project. The Partners module provides

details of partners involved in AADL activities. The contact module provides IIT Mandi AADL

contact details.

Screen Shots:

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5. Ebook- CoursePack

Course pack is an open knowledge system provided by IIT-Madras. It has several student

friendly features which create learning environment more interesting.

Course pack Interface has the following features:

Magazine view in terms of loading book contents.

Video plug-in to handle the streaming/playing of videos.

Links for easy navigation from the magazine view.

Scrolling of pages with scroll image.

Listing/viewing of Quiz, Assignment and Forum lists.

IIT Mandi has developed three courses for course pack which includes details notes for each

chapter integrated with video, quizzes, assignments etc.

Courses Details:

Database system and Design- This course focuses on building the skills of identifying

organizational information requirements, modeling them using conceptual data modeling

techniques. The authors of this book are Dr. Arti Kashyap, Dr. S.Srinath and Prof. D.

Janaki Ram. In this book, each chapter includes video, text, images, PPT’s, quiz and

forum. In addition, at the end of the book assignment is given for practice.

Software Engineering- This course focuses on software engineering principles and

design. The content of this course taken from NPTEL lectures. The authors of this book

are Prof. N.L. Sarda, Prof. Umesh Bellur, Prof. Rushikesh K Joshi and Prof. Rajib Mall.

In this book, each chapter includes video, text, images, quiz and forum. In addition, at the

end of the book assignment is given for practice.

Heat & Mass transfer- This course focuses on Heat & Mass transfer basics. The content

of this course taken from NPTEL lectures. The authors of this book are Prof. S.P.

Sukhatme, Prof. U.N. Gaitonde and Prof. Pradip Dutta. . In this book, each chapter

includes video, text, images and forum. In addition, at the end of the book quiz and

assignment are given for practice.

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Coursepack Screen Shots:

Database system and Design Course Screen shots:

Software Engineering Course Screen shots:

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Heat & Mass transfer Course Screen shots:

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6. Partners

Following are the IIT Mandi partners involved in AADL activities.

MNIT Jaipur

Central Forensic laboratory Chandigarh

Regional Forensic Science Laboratory, Mandi (H.P.)

JNGEC, Sundernagar (H.P.)

Shoolini University, Solan (H.P.)

Mandi Saksharta Evam Jan Vikas Samiti Mandi (H.P.)