Inspiration
What inspired me to come up with this application is simple and very straightforward: low-quality handwriting. I consistently scored low marks on handwritten projects due to the fact that my writing was not legible enough for the teachers. But all this was not was pushed me to write this application. I had always known a kid in my chess club who had low-quality handwriting due to a condition that affected his hands. This prevented him from legibly writing chess notation and the names of students on the sheets. So when I was sitting one day, writing ideas for this hackathon I remembered that kid who struggled at the bare minimum when it came to writing. I remembered how my parents enrolled me in a writing class, and with the right guidance, I was able to improve it. I wanted to be able to give others guidance as well on how to improve their handwriting and not let a condition be a restriction. That idea is what inspired me to write this application because I wanted to be able to help people get better handwriting even though some people might have a condition or problem that may act as a constraint. I believe that everyone has the potential to improve their handwriting with the right resources and support. I wanted to be able to provide those resources and support which led me to develop this application that aims to improve peoples' handwriting.
What it does
This mobile application uses AI (Google's ML Kit) to rate people's handwriting based on the text they write digitally on the application and give tips on how to improve it based on the score that is given.
How we built it
I used Android Studio (Java & XML) to build this application. I implemented Google's ML Kit to be able to recognize that handwriting and then created a custom-built algorithm to give a score based on the results that the AI gave on how accurate the handwriting was.
Challenges we ran into
A major challenge I ran into was how to actually what to use to evaluate the text written. I eventually stumbled onto ML Kit developed by Google which fit perfectly into my needs. But another issue that stemmed was implementing this AI. I read the documentation for hours and was eventually able to put a solution together. The solution worked perfectly and I used the AI's results to develop an algorithm to evaluate the score. These challenges demotivated me at times but in the end, they definitely made me stronger as an individual.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
I'm proud of the fact that I have developed an application that can actually help people. I'm also proud that I was able to have great time management on this project. It's not my first android application but I can proudly say it's almost the best.
What we learned
I've actually learned quite a bit. I learned a lot about AndroidStudio and also learned how to use the documentation properly. I also gained a lot of experience working with AI and recognition. I also learned quite a bit about how to create custom components for mobile development. I also want to thank the organizers for giving me this opportunity to make this application where I was able to take away a lot of fundamental skills.
What's next for Hand Writing Rater
I'm definitely looking to upload this to Google Play Store like my previous Android Projects. I'm also looking at adding support for IOS devices as the ML kit is compatible with IOS just as well as Android. Plus, I would like to add some UI improvements and improve the scoring algorithm as well. I hope to market this application as well and make it more known to the people.
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