1. Developmental Informatics Lab Krithi Ramamritham IIT Bombay ICT for empowering Emerging Regions

2. Developmental Informatics Lab The Big Question How do we give the rural population the same access to Information that you and I take for granted? "How to face the challenges in serving under-served segments of the population through science & technology based solutions”

3. Developmental Informatics Lab Knowledge Revolution Limited to less than 15% population of the world. –Most research and products are for people in highly developed countries. Touches less than 2% of population in developing countries.

4. Developmental Informatics Lab ICT for Socio-Economic Development -- has come of age Research in Indian academia/industry labs IITs - Madras, KGP, Kanpur,…. IIITs – Hyderabad, Bangalore,… MSRI, Intel, Nokia, Motorola, TCS,…. Publication avenues ICTD, WWW DR track, CHI, (VLDB),… journals Lots of challenging issues….

5. Developmental Informatics Lab Internet service provider Cable TV provider Basic telephony (VoIP) E-governance Land records Price info (mandi bhav) Digital photography Astrology (jyotish kendra) Village kiosk services Indian Institute of Technology Bombay

6. Developmental Informatics Lab Internet – a repository of knowledge? Perhaps, but divides exist… The Connectivity Divide –No connectivity –Low bandwidth connectivity –Intermittent connectivity

7. Developmental Informatics Lab Communication Technologies DialUP VSATs Wired Wireless 802.11 Cable Modem DSL Cell Phones WiMaX

8. Developmental Informatics Lab

9. corDECT corDect is a wireless access system developed by IIT,Madras, Midas Communication Technologies, and Analog Communications, USA. It provides voice telephony services and 35/70 kbps internet services with a wireless interface that supports a 10km line of sight connectivity.

10. Developmental Informatics Lab DakNet ad hoc network that uses wireless technology and existing communications and transportation infrastructure to distribute digital connectivity.

11. Developmental Informatics Lab Internet – a repository of knowledge? Perhaps, but divides exist… The Connectivity Divide –No connectivity –Low bandwidth connectivity –Intermittent connectivity The Content Divide –No relevant content –Not accessible/useful to the semi/illiterate population Language divide Interface divide Usability divide

12. Developmental Informatics Lab Water quality sensors Indic Text Input Iconic interfaces Meaning-based Search Tangible Interfaces Interfaces for all Multi lingual Information Storage and Retrieval Polysensors Community fora Digital Library

13. Developmental Informatics Lab Infrastructure Caching Synchronization Ethnographic Studies Prefetching Education Access in Resource Constrained Environment Field Deployments Multimedia Content Services Training Evaluation Light Databases Partnerships Capacity Building e-Pedagogy Computer Based Training Mobile Devices

14. Developmental Informatics Lab How does Web Content come into being? Individuals / institutions / governments place content on the Web –Web pages –Blogs Collaborative content creation –Wiki –Discussion (Q&A) fora Relevant? Topical? Localized? Personalized?

15. Developmental Informatics Lab AQUA Ecosystem Initially, kiosks operated by Vigyan Ashram, Pabal village Initially, Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Baramati (an agri-extension center)

16. Developmental Informatics Lab Village kiosk services Developmental Informatics Lab (DIL) Indian Institute of Technology Bombay Field Observations and Studies are fed back into AQUA research & development AQUA - -> a AQUA

17. Developmental Informatics Lab

18. Images from aAQUA

19. Developmental Informatics Lab Users of aAQUA questions from half the districts in India questions on farming, animal husbandry, employment (BPO), vocational education,…

20. Developmental Informatics Lab Challenges… How can we scale, if each question needs to be answered by an expert? How can we make aAQUA usable for naïve users? How can we ensure availability in spite of resource constraints (e.g., connectivity problems)?

21. Developmental Informatics Lab How to improve… Scalability –After several seasons, questions repeat => archive previous Q&A => search archive for answer –Data integration & consolidation –Multilingual semantics-driven search “insurers cheating farmers” vs. “farmers cheating insurers” Usability Availability

22. Developmental Informatics Lab Consolidating Content: e-Library collection of edited aAQUA Q&A in English, Hindi and Marathi Photos of crop pests and diseases lead to solutions -- without going to experts recommendations from Agri-Universities and KVKs

23. Developmental Informatics Lab Multi Lingual Search over archive Query in Hindi English Document Result in Hindi search English Document Marathi Document E-library Indian Institute of Technology Bombay

24. Developmental Informatics Lab How to improve… Scalability –Exploit repetition of questions => consolidate, archive previous Q&A => Support Multilingual semantics-based search of archive Usability –Better interfaces, better I/O devices => iconic, easy to visualize, easy to use Availability

25. Developmental Informatics Lab Enhancing Usability Keyboard: easy input in Devanagari Use of local language Organizing content by category and keywords keywords Multimedia support, image zoom Multimedia

26. Developmental Informatics Lab Bhav Puchiye – Ask for the price Interface for Bhav Puchiye Most such interfaces are text-based

27. Developmental Informatics Lab Bhav Puchiye DEMO

28. Developmental Informatics Lab User Interest needs to be sustained If a farmer comes to a kiosk to ask a question and is told “network is down, come back later” HE WILL NEVER COME BACK

29. Developmental Informatics Lab How to improve… Scalability Usability Availability –Exploit the “read-mostly” situation –Exploit the “delay-tolerance” aspect of Q&As => Make off-line access the default –Exploit spread of Cell phones

30. Developmental Informatics Lab Dealing with connectivity constraints Lighter pages delivered Mirror sites that synchronize Web Caching and query caching Prefetching –through prediction of future needs and update times

31. Developmental Informatics Lab Improving Availability: Offline Access Standalone application employing store-and-forward protocols –Offline Search and Posting, Authentication. –Complete aAQUA can be navigated and searched in disconnected mode. –Offline post also possible. Fast searching and browsing experience Delta of updates transferred between client and server Heterogeneous database synchronization

32. Developmental Informatics Lab Offline aAQUA aAQUA on internet Light Db Client Application Repository Indexing engine Browser Light Web Server (lighttpd) Update database for new threads Store threads Post messages and fetch new or updated threads Read threads Build index Search Read Write Query optimization for handhelds with varying memory sizes "Best Poster" at WWW 2007: International Conference on the World Wide Web, Banff, Canada.Best PosterWWW 2007

33. Developmental Informatics Lab Poll on aAQUA -- on use of mobile phones

34. Developmental Informatics Lab SMS Question & Answer

35. Developmental Informatics Lab Popular SMS based apps Weather (push or pull) Sports/Entertainment services Transportation services News Innovative personal services: e.g., Market Price information for agricultural goods Personal services: e.g., Using SMS to inform customers in a quasi-real time when the money is transferred to their families, booking movie tickets etc. GIS based content delivery services Weather / temperature sensing capabilities (some high-end phones do have temp sensors)

36. Developmental Informatics Lab aAQUA aAqua Server Crop Doctor Crop Recommendation Keyword Browser Bhav Puchiye aAqua Interne t HTTP aAqua Offline Mobile network Mobile network aAqua Mobile Gateway SMS

37. Enabling technologies 1.Internet crawling, searching, browsing, indexing of multilingual data on the Internet. 2.Data exploration on Heterogenous Data Sources. 3.Improving the performance of information extraction/caching/dissemination algorithms for resource constrained environments. 4.Support for building Databases on handhelds (e.g., Simputer, a low cost hand held developed in India).

38. Developmental Informatics Lab Status and Plans Questions from half the districts of India KVK Baramati – primary expert group Scale-up ICAR via NAIP –Agri Universities Pant Nagar Dharwad –KVKs Maharashtra ArgiNet Spin-off Agrocom – operating the Akashdoot weather station network

39. Developmental Informatics Lab Preventive Agri-Medicine: Climate sensors for crop disease forecasts wind speed wind direction air temperature relative humidity solar radiation evaporation rate leaf wetness

40. Developmental Informatics Lab Summary aAQUA takes Agri-extension services to people wherever they are –New ways of providing expert help to redress farmer problems in a timely fashion Users formulate questions in a natural manner Internet + Mobile phones – prices, aAQUA posts & feeds – push + pull Incorporating innovations from research –Query processing and caching –Seamless offline access –Cross-lingual archive and retrieval –Human-computer Interactions –Heterogeneous Data Integration + semantics driven multilingual search

41. Developmental Informatics Lab ICT for Socio-Economic Development -- has come of age Research in Indian academia/industry labs IITs - Madras, KGP, Kanpur,…. IIITs – Hyderabad, Bangalore,… MSRI, Intel, Nokia, Motorola, TCS,…. Publication avenues ICTD, WWW DR track, CHI, (VLDB),… journals Lots of challenging issues….