Smart Cane

Inspiration When looking at problems related to accesibility and inclusivity, the first thing that comes to mind is the disabled. We have chosen blind people as our target audience for this product ue to the fact that many places such as Singapore are already creating strong, effective solutions to other disability related problems such as paralysis and wheelchairs through the inclusion of ramps in places with stairs. This would be hard to compete with and create a better solution to resulting in us chosing blind people. Blindness is an unfathomable disability as we as humans rely mostly on eyesight the most out of our 5 senses. This inspired us to innovate and create solutions to try and help the blind people why may have a hard time.

What it does

Our blind cane uses inspiration from the already existing canes created to aid the blind. However, there are various problems with the current solutions such as it not taking to account obstacles above the ground. Therefore, we created a similar cane with aditional features such as using a sensor to detect the height of obstacles above and send out a beep, therefore alerting the user towards such obstacles. Furthermore, the cane is connected to a mobile app that uses text to speech to help the blind person use it that allows him to easily navigate around the country when needed. We also included a panic button which can be pressed under destress resulting in a calling for help by projecting their location.

How we built it

We used various sensors and arduino parts such as the buzzer and laser sensor along with buttions to help producs this product. Furthermore, The application going along with it was created using mit app inventor and block coding to help product a more professional design in shorter periods of time.

Challenges we ran into

Time constraints put lots of pressure on our hardware team as various sensors stopped working or were inconsistant calling for changes to the code and wiring to try and increase the consistancy. This resulted in various features being left out such as the use of google maps and a buzzer to help indicate turns depending on the navigation of the map.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are happy to have a complete, working products that can make a genuine impact on the world by helping people with disabilities such as the blind. Furthermore, we are happy with the way we worked together as a team to maximize the time given to work on this project such as sending 1 person down to get meals for everyone or delegating work based on eachothers skillset.

What we learned

We learned that hardware and software have their limitations such as the number of ports on an arduino and the consistancy of code. We are going to use this information to try and have lower margins of error in the future to avoid challenges with such inconsistancy.

What's next for Smart Cane

We would like to try and add other features such as a built in audiobook and music system, specifically designed for blind people to try and make it easier for them to find good entertainment. This is due to them not being able to properly enjoy television or read normal books as there is a limited quantity of brail books. We are looking forward to helping those in need access and get closer to living a life similar to the privlaged.

Built With

• arduino
• buzzer
• c++
• infrared
• mit-app-inventor
• vl53l0x