Week 1

Was going through abrain storming session with Tash and Megan, we spotted a few things that well, pretty much could be implemented in UQ to make the lives of stduent a lot better.

We we mainly targeting non-IT background projects, but me being me having a strong IT background, just couldn't help it so, here are as follows the projects which we thought of.

1. Virtual Directory
We were thinking of like how 1st year students see their timetable with the location on it, and then they have their location but they have no idea how the rooms look like or roughly which part in the building it is located in. A virtual directory will be like a directory which actually show all there details, it will start off with the map of the uni, than if lets say a student wants to find out where room 12-309B, they'll click on building 12, which the directory will zoom in on building 12, than level 3, and than it will pan into a camera view of the corridor on level 3 highligting all the room on that level. So basically this directory will not only show the student how it looks like, but how to get there as well.

2. Vegetable/Herb Garden
This is really one of the strangest/most interesting things we've thought of. However ever we're still thinking on where this veggie graden should go. I was thinking of building on the fact that the stream in the library is like a "landmark" we could add this veggie garden to the stream. Now what makes it interactive, well, we're thinking of add some motion sensor to it, that when it detects people walking around, it would actually play some music, or maybe say "hello" to them or something, but talking plants does sound freaky. Another feature we were thinking about was making it an aeroponic(plants are hung with roots exposed and a mist spray is used to feed them water) as well. This feature will tie in with a weather detection function, that if it detects rain outside, the mist spray will start to spray at the plants, and if there is no rain, than well, it just pretty much leaves it alone.

3. Interactive Toilet
This is actually to counter that feeling that the people in the toilet can actually hear you, when you're like flushing, and doing other things or a secinario when your at the gym taking a shower your face is covered with soap and you can't seem to see where to turn on the shower.
For the flushing problem we were thinking have having someting like a touch pad that plays music to that it covers up the sound of the water, and for things like the shower, instead of turning or pushing, maybe just by waving the hand at the shower head the water will just come out, this can also be used for taps and other thing, furthermore it does save a certain amount of water, it will only be on when it detects someone waving at it.

4. Sensor Carparks
Noticing a large number of students do drive to school, and sometimes it does get very difficult to find an empty parking lot. Ok what does it mean by sensor carparks? There will be a small sensor at the back of everyparking lot, and a digital display board outside the carpark. So when ever a car parks in that lot, the sensor will know that the lot is taken up and will display on the board the number of empty lots remainding. This can even be further implemented to the point where each parking lot is given a number and the sign will display not just the number of empty lots, but also where these lots are. This will prevent the amount of time lost just to search for a parking lot.

5. Travelator From Building 1 to 12
First of all why this idea, well, there is no sheltered pathway from building 1 all the way to building 12. And adding a travelator, like the ones in the airport, will not only save the trouble of walking, but, it will be exceptionally useful for students carrying large objects from one building to another, large objects like, last year's Studio 4 assignments, considering that most student's work are displayed at the library. Still working with sensors, we were thinking of making the shelter being able to detect rain, so if there is no rain, it remainds opened, if there is rain, it will automatically close up, and also to save some electricity, travelator will only move if there is someone standing on it, so at night when there is almost nobody at Uni, the travelator will just stop by itself. There is another feature that we were thinking of, if a student happens to come in the opposite direction, the travelator will actually start beeping as a wanring signal, but well, constraining the travelator to move only in one direction can sound a bit lame at times.

So far there are the ideas we've came up with and we'll trying add more to them.