Here we present HAPIS, a project developed by Claudia Diosan, a student at the Polytechnic School of Lleida. Who, alongside a team of collaborators from the Liquid Galaxy Labs of the Scientific Park of Lleida has developed this complex project with a noble motivation behind.
“The idea for the Homeless Aid Panoramic Interactive System arose from the feeling of helplessness when seeing more and more people every day without being able to make ends meet and with a lack of food and clothing, which are things so basic that they should be available to anyone”, she explains. With this motivation behind, a clear goal was set: to give people with resources the opportunity to help other people in need. Providing a new system to help people without resources and making the delivery of basic commodities to people in need faster and more efficient without requiring intervention by third parties.
HAPIS consists of an app that puts in contact people who need help with those willing to give. Just like everything else as time has passed this project has evolved to try to provide a solution to the concern we talked about before, as feasible as possible. “Initially, the idea was for people in need to create their own account and to contact donors directly. But, when analyzing the situation, I have realized that not all people who need help have a mobile device connected to the Internet. Due to this, there will be volunteers who will be in charge of creating and managing the accounts of these people” Claudia unfolds. Finally, the app features two types of profile: on one hand, we have the volunteers who as it has been mentioned before, create accounts for the people in need and are the ones responsible for them, they enter all the necessary information for the donors; on the other hand, we have the donors who are people that want to offer their services those being: food, clothing, personal hygiene products, employment or accommodation. Information on the person in need that donors have access to is their name, a phone number, their birthdate, a breve description of their situation, a location and a schedule of when they can be found at that location and lastly, the service or resources they lack, in this case, donors can either hand them themselves or through the mediation of volunteers.
The app is also complemented by Liquid Galaxy’s technology as a resource to display more clearly the information of the hardship cases by using mainly placemarks, balloons, and the function of flying to a specific point. Another possible use would be a way to have a more visual record of all profiles.
Claudia is also part of the Women Techmakers organization in Lleida, an initiative led by Google worldwide. This entails that the project actively supports the intentions of the initiative which are to provide visibility, community, and resources for women in technology globally. HAPIS is a brilliant demonstration that we have to demolish the social stigma of reserving the field of technology for men because in reality technology doesn’t have gender and everyone should be able to pursue their dreams regardless of who they are.
Demo video of the Android App
Demo video of the Android App
Short demo of the Liquid Galaxy part next to WTM Lleida lead Paula Vidal
Comments by mentors and helpers
Alexandra Rivero
Main mentor
The situation we are currently experiencing around the world is unprecedented, if we all do our bit, we will get out of this much faster than we think. This is the main idea of HAPIS. I’m Alexandra and I have been involved in this project as a mentor of Claudia to give her some technical support. Being able to participate in this type of open source initiatives such as Google Summer of Code, which also adds value to society is one of the best feelings you can have as a software developer. The Liquid Galaxy Labs of the Scientific Park of Lleida is one of the most active centers in the scope of helping in the training of students through Google scholarships, which are distributed all over the world. This is my fourth year participating with them as a mentor, which is an honor, and I have to say that every year I learn new things and the students surprise me. It is my first project as a mentor of a social project, and being able to see how it has grown has been fantastic. In the coming months we hope to have all the infrastructure ready to bring a full final version of HAPIS to production and be able to do our bit.
Mari Luz Mosteiro
The situation we are currently experiencing around the world is unprecedented, if we all do our bit, we will get out of this much faster than we think. This is the main idea of HAPIS. I’m Alexandra and I have been involved in this project as a mentor of Claudia to give her some technical support. Being able to participate in this type of open source initiatives such as Google Summer of Code, which also adds value to society is one of the best feelings you can have as a software developer. The Liquid Galaxy Labs of the Scientific Park of Lleida is one of the most active centers in the scope of helping in the training of students through Google scholarships, which are distributed all over the world. This is my fourth year participating with them as a mentor, which is an honor, and I have to say that every year I learn new things and the students surprise me. It is my first project as a mentor of a social project, and being able to see how it has grown has been fantastic. In the coming months we hope to have all the infrastructure ready to bring a full final version of HAPIS to production and be able to do our bit.
Mari Luz Mosteiro
Mentor
My role within the HAPIS project was to mentor, advise and guide Claudia during the development of the project from the point of view of software development. Claudia has been always very clear about her idea and how she wants the project to work, so my job in this case was to help her with the technical doubts that she has come to have in some moments of development. In this sense, I would like to highlight the important role of the different development communities (open-source communities, WTM, etc.) in projects like this, since they put a network of contacts within reach students like Claudia, so the members of the communities can support the students to carry out their projects of the best possible way. It is a win win for everyone, always.
This project has coincided with a time of special need around the world, and I hope that in the near future it will be able to help people in economically vulnerable situations.
My role within the HAPIS project was to mentor, advise and guide Claudia during the development of the project from the point of view of software development. Claudia has been always very clear about her idea and how she wants the project to work, so my job in this case was to help her with the technical doubts that she has come to have in some moments of development. In this sense, I would like to highlight the important role of the different development communities (open-source communities, WTM, etc.) in projects like this, since they put a network of contacts within reach students like Claudia, so the members of the communities can support the students to carry out their projects of the best possible way. It is a win win for everyone, always.
This project has coincided with a time of special need around the world, and I hope that in the near future it will be able to help people in economically vulnerable situations.
Paula Vidal
WTM Lleida
Hello my name is Paula Vidal and I’m a highschool senior student at the Gili Gaya highschool in Lleida. Last november I was given the opportunity to start working here as a volunteer helping with projects that caught my attention. I’ve always been a very curious person that loved to learn about everything, and topics such as computing and technology have always been like a mystery to me.I didn’t really know much about them so I didn’t even hesitate to accept this offer.
During these last months that I have been collaborating with projects such as HAPIS or P.E.R.A. (Ponent Exploration and Research in Aerospace) I have learned how to develop projects of this type. And despite the fact that I could not contribute knowledge of computer science or technology, I have always been given the opportunity to present new ideas. I’ve also worked with the Womentechmakers initiative to provide visibility to women in the field of technology.
With total confidence I can say that I’ve had a wonderful experience that has opened the doors to a fascinating world that was unknown to me. It has also provided me with knowledge and tools that I know will be very useful in the not too distant future.
Emilie Ma
GCier team tester
GCier team tester
Hi, I'm Emilie, one of the GCIers who participated in Google Code-in last year. You might know me from some of the webinars I've done, or the Liquid Galaxy GCIers podcast! In this post, I'm going to talk about my experience this summer as a 'trainee mentor' in the Liquid Galaxy project world community, but first: a little about me. I'm a high school student from Vancouver, Canada. As a volunteer, I've been helping out with various GSoC projects as a trainee mentor and with projects in the community for the past summer.
The main project I worked with for the past couple of months is the 3D Visualization API, a GSoC project by Sara Caballero Bruno. (You can see her review video here) This project aims to create an API for visual presentations with Three.js, and allows an easy application of common features of computer graphics to the Liquid Galaxy format.
With this project, I attended weekly meetings, helping to test and write small features for the project. For example, I've been regularly testing and following the README and documentation; and I've written a small help screen feature for the display system. It's been very inspiring to work with open source projects like this, and see the process of creating and managing a project from beginning to nearly the end.
Another project I've worked with is testing the HAPIS app. You can read Claudia's blog post here. HAPIS is an Android app that aims to connect homeless, donors, and volunteers to create opportunities to help each other. With this project, I've been testing the app, going through the feature checklist and sharing feedback about the UI and UX of common app workflows.
The last main project I've been working with is the GCIers podcast. You might have already seen an episode: it's available on YouTube here. In the first episode, we discussed tech, focusing on open source, and talked about some of the impacts of coronavirus. This was the first time I've been on an actual podcast, and it was really interesting to see how a podcast is managed behind the scenes. For example, we held several meetings to discuss timing, script writing, and other aspects of production that are usually more behind the scenes. As well, it was fun to research a topic in depth to share in a condensed format with our listeners, and I hope that I'll be able to continue with the podcast in the future.
I've learned a lot during this period with the Liquid Galaxy project. Being able to get a glimpse into the management and development of such amazing open source projects is super interesting. Watching the workflow between making plans, worklogs, blog posts and listening in on engaging discussions between mentors and students taught me a lot about open source projects. Testing and documentation is an often overlooked area of development, and being engaged with the testing and documentation process allowed me to truly understand the importance of clear documentation and installation guides. I'm amazed by the detailed, innovative work that the students have completed over the past two months, and I'm excited to see what they come up with in the end. This has been a great experience, and I can't wait to continue contributing to the Liquid Galaxy community in months ahead.
Andreu Ibanez
WTM Ambassador
Beside my roles as WTM Ambassador and lead organizer of GDG Lleida and GDG Spain, I’m Director of the R&D Laboratories of the Scientific Park of Lleida, where most of our events and activities are developed. Here I run a very special and unique in the world facility, called the Liquid Galaxy LAB. Born 10 years ago, it’s the headquarters of the Open Source project Liquid Galaxy, that was originally created by Google in 2008 and the one I maintain next to a large developer world community.
Two years ago Claudia Diosan, 4th year CS student of the Polytechnic School of the University of Lleida, approached me to have an intern at our labs and she explained to me his idea of a project to help people in need. I caught the idea on the fly, got a whiteboard and painted a lot of diagrams, HAPIS was born, and Claudia, WTM lead at WTM Lleida has been developing it under an “internship” from Google Summer of Code in the past two summers.
HAPIS project arrives in a perfect but sad timing, with all the world suffering the Covid-19 pandemic, more and more people around are going in need. Our plans from WTM Lleida and all the other groups, like GDG Lleida, Spain and many more partners, is to fully prepare the application and the whole community concept behind, and launch next autumn. Do you want to help ?? DM us at @wtmlleida and let’s work for a better world !!!
