Description

I have a sign outside my office that automatically updates to show my current status based on a variety of sensors, access to my calendar, time of day, etc. It is based on a somewhat ad hoc system being replaced with something that is more general (to handle a variety of IoT sensors and devices) and that has a much better user interface (so it can run on a mobile device).

The central focus of the approach is that users shouldn’t have to think in terms of triggers, but should think in terms of states. For example, one wants to say that the sign should show “I’m Available” if I am in my office, not with someone, not on the phone, and not in a Zoom meeting. Doing this with triggers would require a large set of rules (for each possible transition that can or cannot satisfy these conditions). This is the software engineering aspect.

I have an initial implementation of the update that is relatively complex, incomplete, and basically untested. Moreover, the user interfaces are not ideal. The project here would be to take this new code base and make it work. The code base consists of a rule engine and controller written in Java (Catre), a back end to support multiple users and multiple signs written in Node.JS (iQsign), a user interface for defining and controlling signs written in dart/flutter, a mobile app that uses bluetooth signal strength to provide an abstract location as input written in dart/flutter (Alds), a set of simple devices to detect ones current activities on a machine written in Java (Devices), a set of bridges to various IoT systems including SmartThings, the simple devices, the location checker, and the new sign system written in Node.JS (Cedes), and a user interface for defining and controlling the rule engine written in dart/flutter (Sherpa).

The task of this project would be to take this hodge-podge of code and make it work, look good, and be something that could be generally used. Ideally, one would get the system to the state where it could be used by others and commercialized. Alternatively, you could take one aspect of the system (e.g. Alds) and rewrite it from scratch so that it works appropriately.

Goals we want to achieve

Make it work for multiple users

Make it look better

Incorporate machine learning component