App Improvement Brief

Inspiration

While the GLOBE Observer platform and app is an amazing tool to connect remote sensing, geospatial and satellite data to on the ground citizen science worldwide, it is always important in science to evaluate and improve our methodologies and processes for more accurate and useful scientific results. Incorporating direct user experience, with discrepancies observed in the GLOBE photo records, our project aims to recommend improvements to the GLOBE Observer App to improve data collection and quality.

We were inspired by the desire to make it easier for people to contribute meaningful environmental data to real scientific research. With separate sides of the team contributing user insights as well as perceptions from real-world development experience, we thought it was a great fit to brainstorm ideas together to reduce friction, improve data quality, and better connect users to the real-world impact of their observations.

What it does

The objective of our app improvement proposal is to improve the quality, reliability, and scientific value of user-submitted observations by adding clearer reporting options, stronger photo validation, and better in-app guidance, while also increasing user engagement through feedback, notifications, and clearer connections between observations and real-world scientific impact.

How we built it

We discussed experiences with the GLOBE Observer application and what could be meaningful additions to improve the quality of the app and further its citizen science goals. We then translated these into fully fleshed out ideas regarding the observation submission process, map and geolocation features, notification system, and more, with implementation information across each aspect of the stack and example images to provide visual clarification.

Challenges we ran into

We came up with lot of information and insights to include into our proposal, and as a result not much time was allotted to properly polish formatting of the document or provide additional visual support for each section of the implementation plan.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are proud of the implementation plan we were able to build, and the fact that the detail is appropriate enough to give a stakeholder an idea of the inclusions while also providing potential solutions for developers to implement these features into the live application.

What we learned

We learned about using clear structure and language to write a strong improvement brief, and that writing a brief is all about delivering your points in a concise manner. For Seth specifically, he enjoyed putting himself in a real user's shoes and evaluating from that viewpoint what would be needed.

What's next for App Improvement Brief

Next steps are (hopefully) getting these ideas pitched to NASA to continue growing the GLOBE initiative!

Built With

• docs
• globeapp