Mobile phone applications Karl Morteo - Home | Food … phone applications Karl Morteo. ... are using Short Message Service (SMS) ... I preferred sending a fax for bulk data entry

Information Technology Division (CIO)Information Technology Division (CIO)Mobile Phone ApplicationsMobile Phone Applications

Mobile phone applicationsMobile phone applications

Karl MorteoKarl Morteo


�Any information system that uses a mobile phone.

�From a simple informational text message to a full blown application running on your phone.

�From web application accessed though a phone to a custom client server application to a local application with no storage.

� So now we have narrowed the scope down :-)

What is a mobile phone application?What is a mobile phone application?


�Rapidly evolving technology.

�Competing standards.

�Caught between the ICT giants.

�Massive diversity of phones old and new.

Mobile phone applications are potentially very

expensive to develop and support

so why bother?

Mobile phone application difficulties?Mobile phone application difficulties?


�Timeliness of data

�Accessibility/availability of data

�Accuracy of data

�Extra data from (cell location/GPS,

photo/video/sound, bar code reader)

�User base/Crowd

�Cost

�Superior to computer – portability, easy, network

Why bother with a mobile phone application?Why bother with a mobile phone application?


AGA Animal Disease Tracking System / EMPRES-iAGP Desert locust - Keith CressmanAGP Locust surveillance (Mauritania to India)AGP Monitoring multiplication sites - cassava disease (Central Africa)AGP Large scale pest reporting (Uganda/Tanzania)AGP Pesticide Tracking from customs to use and disposalCIO HQ Phone BookCIO HQ Security Guard SystemCIO Statistical Data Warehouse Browser – Karl MorteoEASY Pol (Mobile banking) – Don’t have own app.ECTAD Viet Nam Animal Disease Alerts (Bird Flu)EST Market Price FOE Forestry publicity iPhone App – Lauren Flejzor FOM Forestry Inventory – In progress - Gino MiceliNR/FO Advanced Fire Information System - SMS Alert - John LathamTCE DPT (Crop Pests) – Phil Fong TCE DPT SADC (Animal Disease) – Phil FongTCE Emergency? Antonio StocchiTCE/AGA Bangladesh SMS Gateway (Animal Disease) - Mat YamageTCI Farmers Field School Monitoring System – Takayuki HagiwaraTCI Rural Invest - Aidan Gulliver


Bangladesh is conducting active Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) surveillance. A total of 450 Community Animal Health Workers (CAHW), 50 Additional Veterinary Surgeons (AVS) and 150 Upazilla Livestock Officers (ULOs) are using Short Message Service (SMS) gateway to collect data and report on disease and death in poultry. The programme has detected HPAI outbreaks.

The SMS reporting structure is simple: at the end of the working day, each CAHW sends a SMS message with the total number of all investigated poultry (chickens, ducks and other birds) and their health status (the number of sick and dead birds) to the SMS gateway system.

This data is used to; A) monitor trends in disease and mortality in poultry, and B) monitor who is working that day. Additionally, CAHWs send flash reports by SMS on suspected outbreaks according to a case definition. The system then automatically contacts the ULO in the same area by SMS, who initiates an investigation by sending an AVS or visits the suspect outbreaks him/herself. After the investigation, the ULOs and AVS send a SMS message to the gateway server to declare the suspect outbreak as negative or report that it may require further (diagnostic) tests. Initially a Gateway server receiving these messages was located at the Department of Livestock Services in Dhaka, the capital. Currently the system is internet based. Specialised staff monitor the change in mortality and morbidity rates and perform spatial and temporal analysis against concurrent HPAI outbreaks and monitor the number of suspect cases and the results of the ULOs and AVS investigations. The result of the analysis is submitted to the Chief Veterinary Officer, used in workshops to sensitise staff and farmers, donor meetings as well as in periodic project reporting. This real-time reporting using SMS has been contributing to effective HPAI outbreak response and control. The key to the success may be its simple approach and clearly defined work-sharing by using familiar tools (mobile phones).

SMS Gateway data collection in Bangladesh


The digital pen user transfers data

after it has been temporarily stored

in the pen, either:

Wirelessly: by ticking a box on the

paper, interpreted by the pen as a

“send” command, the pen will use

Bluetooth to instantly send data via

a mobile phone

Via a USB port: pens connect to

any PC

Sent data is in proprietary Anoto

PGC format and can either be

handled locally or routed to the

application server associated with

that specific paper form for further

processing.

DPT for Animal Health and Crop Pest

Surveillance


DPT for Large scale pest reporting (Uganda/Tanzania)


problem: how to survey rapidly changingDesert Locust upsurges in remote areas, toplan locust control campaigns?

Locust surveillance (Mauritania to India)

Information Technology Division (CIO)Information Technology Division (CIO)Mobile Phone ApplicationsMobile Phone Applications The Fire Email Alerts is the

GFIMS open source alert service

that notifies registered users of

MODIS-derived active fires in a

specified area-of-interest.

The user subscription information

includes their area of interest, alert

frequency (daily/weekly/near real-

time), delivery preferences (text-

only, image and text), etc. The

email alert includes a summary of

number of fires detected and

tabular list of fires.

Daily and Weekly fire alerts are

sent from the GFIMS system,

whereas near real-time alerts are

sent directly from the MODIS Rapid

Response (MRR) facility to avoid

any additional delays in caused by

relaying the data from the MRR to

the GFIMS servers.

GFIMS Global Fire Alert


Distributing food vouchers in the form of mobile

phone text messages

http://www.wfp.org/stories/mobile-phones-

deliver-food-iraqi-refugees

PDAs or SMS data transmission for faster

and more reliable monitoring of food

security.

The data collected includes both food

security baseline data and food insecurity

indicators. The bulk of WFP's data collected

focuses on nutritional indicators, market

prices, import, cross border trades,

socioeconomic indicators, and health

indicators

PDA-based data collection tool "allows very

large questionnaires to be built very rapidly

and deployed onto many PDAs using flash

memory cards

http://sites.google.com/site/wfppdasurvey/


By simply clicking on a particular

school on the GPS map, citizens

can obtain information about

specific aspects of school

performance – including number of

teachers, condition of facilities,

student achievements, status of

nutritional health programs, and

more.

The information is fed into the geo-

referencing database by local

school monitors who send in real-

time data via their cell phones

using SMS text messaging.

Some 8,000 public schools in the

Philippines are currently on the

site, and the number is expected to

grow quickly in the coming

months.

Checkmyschool.org maps information on

public education services in the Philippines


The Ushahidi Platform allows anyone to

gather distributed data via SMS, email or

web and visualize it on a map or timeline.

Our goal is to create the simplest way of

aggregating information from the public for

use in crisis response.

Also a server for FrontlineSMS including

SwiftRiver a free and open source software

that uses algorithms and crowd sourcing to

validate and filter news.

http://haitiaidmap.org/

http://ushahidi.com/

Data can be collected using multiple

mobile phones using the EpiCollect mobile

app(Android / iPhone ) and all data can be

synchronised from the phones and viewed

centrally (using Google Maps) via the

Project website or directly on the phones.

http://www.epicollect.net/


The World Bank DataFinder app for

iPhone/iPad, which provides 50 years

of indicator data in your pocket, is now

available. The app takes advantage of

the DataFinder APIs to chart and

visualize indicator data, and makes it

easy to share what you find with

colleagues.

The World Bank DataFinder


The OECD Factbook AppThe OECD Factbook App presents 100

economic indicators in a format

specially designed for your iPhone.

Now, wherever you are, you have easy

access to a comprehensive statistical

picture of the world’s major economies

from the most reliable source: OECD.


Considerations

�Who will use the application?

�The application criticality

�The Target Phones

�The Network Connectivity

�Usability and user acceptance

�Reliability

�Data ownership and privacy concerns

�The mobile phone needs to communicate..

So you need a mobile phone applicationSo you need a mobile phone application


�Specialists – assessment/inventory.

�Clerks, data gathers - census.

�Service deliverers - extension workers, customs.

�End users, farmers - counterfeit prevention

�General public – crowd.

� Training requirements?

� Support requirements?

� Sustainability?

Who will use the application?Who will use the application?


�Continuously essential to carry out job function.

�Periodically required to carry out job function.

�More efficiently/effectively/conveniently carry out job function.

�Keep informed.

�For publicity, awareness, entertainment.

In the event of disaster are there any alternatives to using the application?

The application criticalityThe application criticality


�Specified exact model.

�Known possible models.

�Specify minimum compatible models.

�Almost any model.

� Who purchases/owns the phones? pays the running costs? Limited to FAO users? Sustainability?

� The diversity of target phones that must be supported greatly influences the development approach.

The Target Phones The Target Phones


�Can vary from continuously available high speed internet to occasionally available SMS only, peer-to-peer or snail mail of SD-Cards.

� Unreliable/mixed network requires more information to be saved and cached locally and complex programming to synchronize or get theinformation off the phone

� Caching, synchronization, multi user, data integrity, conflict locking

� Multimodal transfers: GPRS, WiFi, SMS, and USB tether

� Packetisation for large data

� Who pays the running costs? Sustainability? I blew all the credit calling my girl friend because it picked up the GSM from neighboring country.

The Network Connectivity The Network Connectivity


�Is the application user friendly and intuitive? Does it replace an existing ?

�How can I correct my mistaken data entry.

� You need the patience of a saint to use this application.

� My fingers are too big and my eyesight too poor.

� I don’t have the time to complete all that information in the field. The old paper and telephone was much faster and the secretary corrected it.

� It requires on site data entry for geo-coordinate sake but there is no network there.

� I preferred sending a fax for bulk data entry job sent to India/China.

� Why don’t I get one of the phones? Joe did.

� I am certain I sent the message but they say it never arrived?

Usability and user acceptanceUsability and user acceptance


�Device robustness, reliability and battery life in field conditions (sunlight, temperature, precipitation, humidity, dust).

�Viruses

�The Network (see other slide)

� My pencil and paper system never ran out of battery, credit or lost my days work.

Reliability Reliability


�Data ownership, privacy and confidentiality issues

� Are you spying on me to see where I am going and when

I am working?

� Is it acceptable for data to leave the country (route,

host)?

� Who can see the data?

� Can I retrieve, delete/correct the data in the future?

Data ownership and privacy concernsData ownership and privacy concerns


�What server services are needed?

�In the most basic case this could be peer-to-peer or SMS Gateway but most likely a FAO application will need to access and contribute to data in our core data repositories/warehouses and operational systems. This necessitates strong information management and the use of open interoperability standards.

� web-services, RSS, RDF, Xforms, FeedSync, KML …

The mobile phone needs to communicate..The mobile phone needs to communicate..


CIO ActivitiesCIO Activities

�Building expertise - Mobile Device Programming

Training held in August

�Optimization of FAO’s web site for viewing on

mobile devices.

�Set-up global and local SMS Gateway

Infrastructure (GSM Modem and web-services).

�Support for data connectivity to FAO services

(Multimodal transfers and Packetisation ).

�Cross platform development: recommendations,

tools and support for both high end smart

phones (appcelerator) and basic phones

�Upgrade of email servers to support ActiveSync

Documents

Mobile phone applications Karl Morteo - Home | Food … phone applications Karl Morteo. ... are using Short Message Service (SMS) ... I preferred sending a fax for bulk data entry