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Open Data Kit

http://code.google.com/p/open-data-kit

data collection, mobile phones

About

In the developing world, the lack of reliable infrastructure, ubiquitous connectivity, and adequate expertise makes data collection difficult. Currently, most organizations collect data on paper forms despite inefficiencies such as the physical collection of completed forms, data transcription errors, and long delays before the data is available.

The exponential growth of cell phone usage and infrastructure in developing regions has aroused great excitement for using mobile devices to address current gaps in data gathering. In addition to the variety of data -- text, photos, location, audio, video, barcode scans -- that can be gathered, mobile devices have proven to be dramatically faster at both collecting the data and making it available to decision makers. Moreover, deploying mobile devices can be less expensive and less error prone than using pen and paper.

open data kit

Open Data Kit (ODK) is suite of tools that enables users to collect their own rich data. ODK is designed to let users own, visualize, and share data without the difficulties of setting up and maintaining servers. The tools are easy to use, deploy, and scale. They also go beyond open source — they’re based on open standards and supported by a larger community.

ODK’s goals are to make tools modular and customizable so that they can be easily composed into appropriate arrangements for each deployment; exploit open interfaces and standards so that solutions are not "siloed" into monolithic enterprise-level packages tha tare difficult to understand and maintain; and establish data collection tools at the cutting edge of technology so as to avoid early obsolescence and make it easier to attract talented developers.

available tools

ODK Collect is powerful phone based replacement for your paper forms. Collect is built on the Android platform and can collect a variety of form data types: text, location, photos, video, audio, and barcodes.

ODK Aggregate provides a ready to deploy online repository to store, view and export collected data. Aggregate is currently implemented on Google App Engine and enables free hosting of data on Google's reliable infrastructure.

ODK Manage maintains a database of all phones in a deployment to enable remote device management. By sending an SMS to a deployed phone, Manage can trigger the transfers of forms, data, and applications.

ODK Validate ensures that you have a OpenRosa complaint form -- one that will also work with all the ODK tools.

ODK Voice facilities mapping XForms to sound snippets that can be played over a "robo" call to any phone. Responses are collected using the phone's keypad (DTMF) and are automatically aggregated.

demo video

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