Touch is one most of the important aspects of human life. Nearly all interactions, when broken down, involve touch in one form or another. Recent advances in technology, particularly in the field of virtual reality, have led to increasing interest in the research of haptics. However, accurately capturing touch is still one of most difficult engineering challenges currently being faced. Recent advances in technology such as those found in microcontrollers which allow the creation of smaller sensors and feedback devices may provide the solution. Beyond capturing and measuring touch, replicating touch is also another unique challenge due to the complexity and sensitivity of the human skin. The development of flexible, soft-wearable devices, however, has allowed for the creating of feedback systems that conform to the human form factor with minimal loss of accuracy, thus presenting possible solutions and opportunities. Thus, in this review, the researchers aim to showcase the technologies currently being used in haptic feedback, and their strengths and limitations.

The means of assisting visually impaired and blind (VIB) people when travelling usually relies on other people. Assistive devices have been developed to assist in blind navigation, but many technologies require users to purchase more devices and they lack flexibility, thus making it inconvenient for VIB users. In this research, we made use of a mobile phone with a depth camera function for obstacle avoidance and object recognition. It includes a mobile application that is controlled using simple voice and gesture controls to assist in navigation. The proposed system gathers depth values from 23 coordinate points that are analyzed to determine whether an obstacle is present in the head area, torso area, or ground area, or is a full body obstacle. In order to provide a reliable warning system, the research detects outdoor objects within a distance of 1.6 m. Subsequently, the object detection function includes a unique interactable feature that enables interaction with the user and the device in finding indoor objects by providing an audio and vibration feedback, and users were able to locate their desired objects more than 80% of the time. In conclusion, a flexible and portable system was developed using a depth camera-enabled mobile phone for use in obstacle detection without the need to purchase additional hardware devices.

There are 24.5 million visually impaired and blind (VIB) students who have limited access to educational materials due to cost or availability. Although advancement in technology is prevalent, providing individualized learning using technology remains a challenge without the proper tools or experience. The TacPic system was developed as an online platform to create tactile educational materials (TEM) based on the image inputs of users who do not have prior experience in tactile photo development or 3D printing. The TacPic system allows the users to simply upload images to a website and uses AI cloud computing on the Amazon Web Services platform. First, it segments and labels the images. Then, the text label is converted into braille words. Subsequently, surface rendering and consolidation of the image and text is performed, before it is converted into a single file that is ready for 3D printing. Currently, the types of TEM that can be created are tactile flashcards, tactile maps, and tactile peg puzzles, which can be developed within a few hours. This is in contrast to a development period of weeks using traditional methods. Furthermore, the tactile educational materials were tested by two VIB teachers and six VIB students. It was found that those who are congenitally blind need more time to identify the object and rely more on the braille labels compared to students who became blind at a later age. Teachers also suggested producing TEM that use simpler images, and TEM that are suitable for both sighted and VIB students. In conclusion, the researchers successfully developed a platform that allows more educators or parents to develop personalized and individualized TEM. In the future, further optimization of the algorithms to improve segmentation and the inclusion of other features, such as color, could be undertaken. Finally, new printing materials and methods are needed to improve printing efficiency.

Existing edge computing architectures do not support the updating of neural network models, nor are they optimized for storing, updating, and transmitting different neural network models to a large number of IoT devices. In this paper, a cloud-edge smart IoT architecture for speeding up the deployment of neural network models with transfer learning techniques is proposed. A new model deployment and update mechanism based on the share weight characteristic of transfer learning is proposed to address the model deployment issues associated with the significant number of IoT devices. The proposed mechanism compares the feature weight and parameter difference between the old and new models whenever a new model is trained. With the proposed mechanism, the neural network model can be updated on IoT devices with just a small quantity of data sent. Utilizing the proposed collaborative edge computing platform, we demonstrate a significant reduction in network bandwidth transmission and an improved deployment speed of neural network models. Subsequently, the service quality of smart IoT applications can be enhanced.

Traditional teacher-centered teaching focused on classroom lectures has met numerous challenges in recent years, which has motivated teachers to make use of design thinking for their classes. This study made use of design thinking in an iOS programming course to find ways to improve the students’ critical thinking, learning motivation and solve practical issues through mobile APP development. In the program, students were required to answer situational motivation questionnaires before and after design thinking is implemented in the course. Results showed that the values of the Cronbach’s Alpha for the initial course expectation in both iterations were reliable. Subsequently, when students feel that the solutions are recognized and supported by other students and teachers in the course, there is an upward trend in the curves of their external regulation, identified regulation, and intrinsic motivation. This study successfully designed the course content and evaluation methods that have shown significant increase in the students’ motivation through the incorporation of design thinking in the mobile application programming course.