TrackAid- Faculty Locator
Paper (Abstract + Concept Note)
Group 4: Roshni Kapoor, Hetal Rathi and Ayushi Shah
ABSTRACT:
Meeting a Srishti staff or a faculty to clear all your doubts, to get more information on a certain topic or just meet them in between their class schedules seems like an arduous impossible task. TrackAid, in this case acts as a helping hand to fix appointments with faculty at a common convenient time with no hassle or confusion to try and find a facilitator through the floors and classrooms. A chatbot and a voice interface adds additional ease and enhances the user experience to a great extent.
Humans, as social animals depend on human interaction at every step of our lives. A huge part of this interaction is the user experience which takes place through an interface, which sits between the user and a service. Hence, improving the interaction and user experience is of utmost importance. The natural way of interactions for humans between each other is usually spoken language. Being one of the first interfaces we ever came up with, it still seems to be the most natural and effective way of communication. Moreover, as time has progressed, new technologies have gotten us used to a certain level of speed and efficiency that humans can no longer provide. Hence, this led to the emergence of chatbots, a new and growing technology that provides human like experiences combined with the efficiency of a machine. In addition, combining language and conversation with an interface introduces an opportunity for humans to easily interact with a machine. They help one to interact in real time making the system becomes much more user-friendly.
CONCEPT NOTE:
Trying to make the interaction easy and efficient, TrackAid helps one to get in touch with faculty members and other Srishti staff at an ease. It will help an individual to fix an appointment as per one’s preferred timing. In order to enhance the user’s experience, chatbots with a voice interface has been used. Using a conversational interface will give accurate and instant replies. It’s an easier and faster way to get things done. This will help the students know the availability of the faculty during college hours.Moreover, a human might wander away in the middle of their duty but such is not the case with technology.One of the recent voice interfaces that have grown popularity amongst iPhones is Hey Siri! Our voice based interface is inspired by the workings of the same. Siri is a voice activated assistant who mimics human intelligence and natural conversation. It interprets voice instructions and carries out the action and one has the option to edit if the interpretation is incorrect. On similar grounds TrackAid will get things done easier and faster, letting students and visitors know the whereabouts of faculty and other staff members during college hours. It will provide certain kind of skills and capabilities that will help it to perform the required actions.
HOW IT WORKS:
TrackAid will have the capability to search by two ways, either by typing or by using the chatbot interface. A faculty can also be located by searching through the route of a major or department. If the path of faculty is chosen, the path takes you through a simple step by step process of finding a faculty through the floors and classrooms. The user informs the voice based interface the name of a faculty that he/she wants to meet, on which the TrackAid will confirm a few details like position/department, image and name. Once the confirmation is received from the user, there current location will be shown to the user along with the location barcode, so as to make the commute to that place easier and faster.
On the other hand, if the faculty/staff is busy an alternative time to meet will be provided, once that is confirmed by the student and the faculty through email, the meeting is scheduled. A notification will be sent to the faculty before fixing the meeting.
Demo Video
