Applied Research Day

The objective of this project is to design and implement a friction testing machine to help develop an ASTM standard for non-slip surfaces in water parks. This team’s main task has been creating a data acquisition system to collect and process the data from the machine. Important parameters must be measured and logged such as torque, normal forces, angle of twist, and vibrations. This data needs to be displayed in real time as well as logged for future use.

This project focuses on developing an innovative display case lighting system for museums, featuring LED lighting and interactive controls. The system is powered by an ESP32 microcontroller and incorporates a BH1750 light sensor for ambient light adjustment. Users can control the lighting through RFID authentication, allowing personalized or automated adjustments for enhanced exhibit visibility. The project aims to create an engaging experience while maintaining artifact preservation standards. The circuit design is implemented using Fritzing, ensuring efficient integration of components.

Tree Inventory for the Stormwater Management Pond on Woodroffe campus.

Cookful is an innovative web platform created to significantly reduce household food waste by matching users’ available ingredients with personalized recipes. It addresses common meal-planning challenges, such as effectively using expiring or leftover ingredients and generating recipe ideas based on individual preferences.

The application features comprehensive user profiles and inventory management, enabling users to easily organize their ingredients, plan meals efficiently, and maintain cooking inspiration. Integrated with an AI-powered search engine, Cookful quickly provides recipe suggestions customized to users’ dietary preferences and available ingredients.

Cookful also fosters an interactive community environment where users can share recipes, cooking tips, and meal planning ideas, enhancing engagement and creativity in the kitchen. Through intuitive user experience design and a commitment to sustainability, Cookful simplifies everyday cooking, encourages healthier lifestyle choices, and contributes positively to environmental goals by minimizing food waste.

1. Opening

TripAgog is a travel platform designed to help users explore cities and destinations by discovering unique places, building custom trips, and sharing their journeys with others. For both locals and visitors, TripAgog offers a distinctive way to uncover hidden gems and create personalized experiences with its easy-to-use itinerary builder. Our project involves a comprehensive website redesign aimed at crafting a visually appealing and user-centric marketing website that enhances TripAgog’s brand recognition.

2. Client’s needs and what the project aims to achieve

The primary objective is to create a visually stunning new marketing website to attract visitors and encourage them to download the TripAgog app, ultimately driving business growth. This will be achieved by showcasing TripAgog’s unique features – personalized recommendations, itinerary building, user-generated content clearly and engagingly.

The redesigned website will establish TripAgog as a trustworthy and user-friendly travel platform that meets the diverse needs of travelers. Key goals include enhancing the user experience, improving search engine rankings through strategic SEO implementation, and creating engaging content tailored to the target audience. The design includes plans for a page showcasing North American cities with blog content and pre-built itineraries. There will also be a review section displaying feedback from other users about the app.

3. The steps taken to resolve the need

The project follows a structured four-phase approach: Define, Design, Develop, and Deploy. The Define phase included attending stakeholder meetings, conducting competitor analysis, performing target audience research, creating a content strategy and inventory, identifying information architecture, and building a project plan.

The design phase resulted in 3 Personas, 3 Mood Boards, a Sitemap, a New logo, Low-fi Wireframes, an interactive prototype in Figma, and a Branding Guide. The Development phase involves the construction of a high-fidelity prototype in Figma, with all pages containing populated content, and the integration of SEO and accessibility features. Finally, the deploy phase involves preparing a final review, gathering stakeholder feedback, and a client handoff package.

4. Outcome

This project offers valuable learning opportunities for the team, including enhanced collaboration skills, deeper insights into web design principles, and practical experience in addressing real-world client needs.

Looking ahead, the team is dedicated to delivering a high-fidelity Figma prototype that meets TripAgog’s objectives and enhances its brand image.

Urban Camel is an on-demand moving and delivery platform designed to connect users with reliable movers for transporting furniture and household items. Much like Uber revolutionized personal transportation, Urban Camel simplifies the process of moving bulky items—offering a fast, seamless, and hassle-free experience.
To ensure maximum accessibility, the app is being developed for both iOS and Android using React Native, allowing us to build a single, unified codebase for both platforms. The project goes beyond just developing an app—we are building an entire startup from scratch, working closely with the founder, Sienna Hermanry, to shape the product, define its features, and bring it to life.

Before starting the design and development process, our team conducted an in-depth product research study, analyzing six competitors and similar platforms. This research helped us: identify industry standards, recognize common pain points, discover opportunities for differentiation.

To gain direct insights from our target audience, we conducted two targeted surveys—one for our primary users (customers needing to move furniture) and another for our secondary users (movers offering services). These insights allowed us to refine the app’s feature set and ensure real market demand.

With research-backed insights, our team created detailed user personas and use cases before structuring the Information Architecture—a roadmap defining all features to be developed across three phases. We also designed the brand identity, selecting colors, typography, and crafting a professional logo.

Our design team then developed over 60 high-fidelity app screens, ensuring an intuitive and frictionless user experience. The app includes two user interfaces within one platform, adapting dynamically based on whether the user is a customer or a mover.

For the Minimum Viable Product (MVP), we focused on essential features required for a fully functional and scalable platform. Developing Urban Camel presented several key challenges, including secure payment processing, real-time furniture tracking, and the complexity of building two distinct user experiences—one for movers and one for customers—within a single application. To tackle these, our development team dedicated two months to research and Proof of Concept (PoC) implementations, testing industry best practices and real-world solutions.

For payments, we integrated Stripe, a leading payment processor, ensuring a seamless and secure transaction experience similar to platforms like Uber. Every detail was carefully configured to enhance security and user confidence.

For real-time tracking, we optimized API usage to reduce costs while maintaining smooth user experience. Instead of sending 60 API calls per minute, we developed an adaptive tracking algorithm that adjusts update frequency based on movement speed and a bounce timer. This approach keeps tracking accurate while significantly lowering API costs. The system simulates continuous movement through interpolated updates, providing a fluid visual experience for users.

These are just a few examples of how we overcame technical hurdles. Below is a list of key MVP features:

User Authentication & Authorization (secure sign-in), Job Request System (users can create moving requests)
Image Upload & Storage (for furniture photos), Mover Selection (choosing a preferred mover), Integrated Payments (using Stripe for secure transactions), Real-Time Notifications (updates on job status)
Mover Dashboard (job management for service providers), Ratings & Reviews (ensuring service quality)
Live Tracking with Google Maps (for real-time monitoring).

To build a robust and scalable system, we used modern and proven technologies:
Frontend: React Native (for cross-platform development), NativeWind (for styling), Redux (for state management), Google Maps API (for real-time tracking).

Backend: Node.js (server-side logic), Firebase (database), Google Cloud (cloud infrastructure), Stripe (payment processing).

Urban Camel is a market-ready product, built from the ground up to solve a common pain point: how to move furniture easily without owning a large vehicle. With a sleek, intuitive app and a solid technical foundation, it is well-positioned to disrupt the moving industry in the same way Uber transformed personal transportation.

Insight 360: Optimize Smarter, Rank Higher!

Insight 360 is a cutting-edge SEO tool designed to help businesses optimize their online presence through data-driven insights. By offering automated SEO reports, competitive analysis, and a user-friendly dashboard, the platform empowers digital marketers, business owners, and agencies to make informed decisions that enhance search rankings and overall online visibility.
With an intuitive interface and a scalable model, Insight 360 caters to both beginners and experienced professionals, streamlining SEO management and simplifying complex data into actionable recommendations.

Key Features & Benefits

Automated SEO Reports – Real-time insights into website performance, keyword rankings, and areas for improvement without manual intervention.
Competitor Analysis – Track competitors’ performance, identify trends, and optimize strategy accordingly.
User-Friendly Dashboard – A clean, structured interface makes SEO management accessible, even for users with minimal technical knowledge.
White-Label Reports – Agencies and professionals can customize reports for clients, enhancing their service offerings.
Freemium & Scalable Model – Users start with a free plan and upgrade as their needs grow, making Insight 360 a flexible, budget-friendly solution.

Target Audience

Insight 360 is designed for:
– Digital marketers seeking efficient SEO tools to streamline workflow
– Business owners looking to improve their business
– SEO agencies needing automated reports and white-label solutions.
– Freelancers managing multiple projects and looking for an all-in-one SEO platform.

Collaboration and Achievements

Developing Insight 360 was a hands-on opportunity to apply our skills in a real-world project of this scale. As students, we tackled the challenges of designing and building a functional SEO tool from the ground up, simulating the experience of working on an industry-level product.
One major challenge was integrating real-time data from multiple SEO analytics sources while ensuring accuracy and performance. We addressed this by optimizing API calls, implementing efficient data parsing techniques, and using caching to reduce load times. Another challenge was designing an intuitive interface that simplified complex SEO data for users with varying levels of expertise. To achieve this, we structured key insights into visually appealing graphs and charts, making performance trends, keyword rankings, and competitor analysis easy to interpret. Through user testing and iterative UI/UX improvements, we refined the dashboard to enhance clarity and usability.
Collaboration across development, UI/UX design, and project management was crucial. We learned to balance technical constraints with user needs, solve design inconsistencies, and ensure seamless functionality. These experiences strengthened our problem-solving skills and prepared us for real-world industry challenges.

Conclusion

Insight 360 is more than just an SEO tool—it’s a strategic asset for businesses looking to dominate search rankings with minimal effort. With its automation, competitor insights, and user-friendly features, it empowers users to optimize smarter and rank higher.

This research examined why Ottawa’s youth (18-25) had low participation in city-led recreational programs. Through surveys, interviews, and data analysis, we identified key participation barriers such as financial constraints, lack of awareness, and program inflexibility. The findings helped create recommendations for improving outreach strategies and program design, ideas that align with the City of Ottawa’s goals of community well-being. The outcome of this project involves a designed solution that aims to increase participation and create long-term, meaningful recreational opportunities for young adults by enhancing visibility and fostering a more engaging recreational environment.
Working on this project provided valuable insights into the complexities of engaging Ottawa’s youth in recreational programs. One of the primary challenges was recruiting participants for surveys and interviews, as identifying effective channels to reach the target demographic proved difficult. This challenge underscored the broader difficulties faced by the City of Ottawa in promoting its programs to young adults. The research process was enriching, as direct engagement with youth and subject matter experts offered deeper perspectives on the barriers to participation. These conversations fostered a more empathetic approach, ensuring that the proposed solutions accurately reflected the needs and preferences of the target audience. Additionally, the findings challenged initial assumptions, reinforcing the necessity of data-driven decision-making over speculation. The experience highlighted the critical role of user-centered design in developing effective, inclusive, and impactful solutions for community engagement.

As the Social Innovation Lab’s SPEnD research initiative concludes, we are launching two new student-led social enterprises at Algonquin College this summer. These ventures, Green Loop Club and SPEnDless, are designed to address specific needs within our community.

Our social enterprises are guided by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, ensuring they contribute to a more sustainable future. The “Xplore Impact” tool, developed by previous SPEnD students, has been instrumental in shaping our initiatives by drawing inspiration from global social entrepreneurship models.

We invite you to join us at the Applied Research Showcase to learn about our progress and help refine these innovative ventures as they come to life on campus. Your feedback will be invaluable in helping us launch successful and impactful social enterprises.