Since we published ARLearn in Google Play, we recorded almost 100 installs and more then 150 games have been created so far. Some users have requested new features which makes us of course very happy. In order to facilitate this, we started gathering these issues at one place

The ARLearn Google Code project is the place where we manage our code. Here, users can request new features or (even better) star existing issues. By starring an issue you underline its importance and indicate that you need this functionality as well. We hope that offering his voting function to the community will give us more insight in your needs.

In het project Het Leren van de Toekomst gaan Pabo-studenten aan de slag met ARLearn. Rianne Tolsma en Ellen Domke van Iselinge Hogeschool leggen uit hoe ze ARLearn zullen gebruiken.

Lees meer hierover op http://innovatie.kennisnet.nl/leren-in-dialoog-met-de-omgeving/

Begin dit jaar heeft Thies de Jong -in het kader van z'n scriptie onderzoek- ARLearn ingezet om wiskunde te doceren op zijn school. Concreet heeft hij onderzocht welke motivatie verschillen er zijn bij een spel-gebaseerde versus een niet spel-gebaseerde aanpak met ARLearn.

Op de website van Bogerman - de school waar Thies werkzaam is - kun je meer lezen over hun ervaring met onze tool:

http://www.bogerman.nl/2012/07/nieuw-nummer-oudercontactblad-de-boog/ (Op pagina 5 vind je het ARLearn artikel)

A couple of weeks ago, I received two brand new HTC devices with Near Field Communication (NFC) support. NFC enabled Android phones can read passive RFID tags, but can also use this short-range wireless technology to exchange (small) messages (Android Beam). NFC in that sense competes with bluetooth. Compared to bluetooth, NFC

• requires the devices to be really close (<4cm)
• does not require the devices to pair before communicating. 

Although the latter features comes in handy from usuability point of view, it has already been shown that this can help hackers to get access to your phone.

Last week, Hendrik Drachsler, Leonardo Lezcano and myself started brainstorming on how we could use Android Beam to facilitate the handover of medical discharge letters between doctors and patients. Sharing these letters with patients and providing extra services around gives patients more insight on their health. Furthermore the app for patients can be extended with extra functionality to give them for instance more information about e.g. their mediciation. If you want to know more about this handover problem, read further at http://www.handover.ou.nl/.

In this blogpost, I'll show you a (very) early prototype that demonstrates how a doctor can pass a discharge letter to a patient's mobile device via Near Field Communication. 

The screenshot shows the mobile device from the perspective of a General Practioner. Screen 2, shows the discharge letters, relevant to a patient. Screen 3 visualizes data available on the discharge letter (e.g. "Problems and Diagnosis", "Medication", etc.)

The following video now illustrates how I can pass this information via android beam to another device.

Note that this is an early prototype and the wireframe for both General Practioner and Patient will be subjected to change. However this video illustrates how NFC technology can be used within the medical domain.

ARLearn is a toolkit for mobile field trips and (serious) games. The ANDROID app is already for some weeks available via Google Play. It has been successfully piloted with cultural science students in Florence and an ARLearn security simulation has been organised with employees of UNHCR.

Till now ARLearn content creation was cumbersome. Apart from manually crafting JSON encoded game files, there was no convenient way to create an ARLearn game. Today we're releasing a functional authoring tool for ARLearn. Admitted, the tool is not perfect yet but it greatly speeds up the time necessary to create a game. Furthermore, this tool supports monitoring the progress of the different users. By creating a game run, games can be played with real users.

The following video shows how to get started with the ARLearn authoring tool.

Try this yourself at http://streetlearn.appspot.com/Authoring.html and download the ARLearn android app. This release of the authoring tool features

• Four kinds of media objects: narrative objects, multiple choice questions, videos and audio objects.
• Map based (re)positioning of media items
• A powerful notification framework. Modifications to runs or games are made available real time to the android app.
• Support for downloading games and runs to your computer, so that they can be reused.

Other features that are supported by ARLearn, but have not yet made it to the authoring tool include

• Dependencies. Through dependencies media objects are linked. For instance, feedback objects can be bound to actions such as giving an answer.
• Radius triggers to make media visible only when the user is near to an object.
• Manual triggers that enable the operator to make items appear or disappear.
• Other media objects like pickup items or zones where items can be dropped.