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APPSLAB

CITYUAPPS LABCITYUAPPS LAB

CityU Apps Lab

http://appslab.hk

@cityuappslab

appslab@cityu.edu.hk

Issue 10/ Fall/ 2015

Fostering A New Way of LearningFostering A New Way of Learning

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Dr. Roy Cheung

In this 10th issue of CAL newsletter, we put together some exciting new development during the summer semester 2014/15. Since May we have been using a new co-working space in G1301, which consists of two floors. The ground floor is mainly used by the maker team, the ROV team and the design team, whereas the first floor is used by the CAL software team and the operation team. Thank you very much for the support from College of Science and Engineering (CSE).

For the coding initiative, we have successfully launched 10 consecutive monthly Hour of Code HK campaign. Starting in Oct 2015, we recently received the generous venue sponsorship by the HK Science & Technology Park for HOC-HK. This summer was a very busy season running multiple coding sessions, including exchange students from Mainland China, Chengdu, Taiwan, and we are pleased to have reached over 10,000 coding hours. For the Sino Go Code program, together with Sino Group and WebOrganic, the 300+ students feedback are mostly positive, and we have scheduled the graduation ceremony in Jan 2016.

How can we use the mobile phone to automatically generate a customized resume? CAL has worked closely with the University Student Development Service for the Career App. Let’s give a try! I am also very impressed by the summer project workshop led by Nelson. One of the teams has developed an Instagram App within 4-weeks time for both iOS and Android. These students are all very passionate and self-motivated. We are fortunate to recruit them to the CAL project team.

HKU has organized two Startup Weekend events, and incredibly the two champions both consist of CityU CAL members. We hope to bring Startup Weekend event to CityU with KTO, EDGE and Innovation Commons, and create inter-institutional collaborations amongst different local Universities. With the support from Ambassador School Program (ASP), we have recruited 20 IT-focused secondary and primary school generating huge synergy in this community. Nevertheless, the 3rd DBSxCAL Talk was another great success, and we may organize the 4th one at the Vault in DBS. We welcome you to join us!

Director of CAL

Sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) is a leading cause of death in

Hong Kong, which claims about 3400 victims a year.

The key of survival is timely defibrillation and

cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), and thus defibrillators

and lay rescuers must be easily accessible within minutes.

In view of this, I am leading a technical team of CityU Apps

Lab in collaboration with the Hong Kong Sudden Cardiac

Death (SCD) Prevention Program, coordinated by Dr. Kit

Chan, Associate Consultant and Cardiology Specialist of

Ruttonjee and Tang Shiu Kin Hospitals.

CONTENT12 Apps World Spine Day Promotes Posture Check App

14 Across the Disciplines Apps for Crime Prevention

16 Innovation DBSxCAL Talk: Smart Living with Technology Saving Lives through Healthcare Innovation

18 Entrepreneurship CityU FinTech Teams Headed to Silicon Valley

6 Cover Story Fostering A New Way of Learning

8 Coding Workshops Go Code: The Coding Journey of the Creators Cultivating Coding Culture in Primary & Secondary Schools

Our aim is to design a real-time rescuing system using mobile phone technology and mobile positioning system to:

1. locate and display local automated external defibrillators (AEDs) locations;

2. disseminate group broadcast to nearby lay rescuers;

3. recruit nearest lay rescuers to provide bystander CPR;

4. recruit nearest lay rescuers to reach AEDs for defibrillation.

Mobile phones are the most ubiquitous modern technology

nowadays. With about 17 million mobile service subscribers as of

March 2015, Hong Kong has one of the highest penetration rates

in the world at about 233%. Owing to their wide availability and

advanced capabilities, mobile phones possess a strong potential

for lifesaving, emergency dispatch and rescue network. Our devoted

team has been working on this project for the last two months and

hopefully the system will soon be available for private testing. If

you find this project meaningful and want to be part of it, either

contributing your technical knowledge or joining as a volunteer

tester, please drop me an email and we are

always happy to hear from you.

Mr Van TingAssociate Director of CAL

(Technology Innovation)

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From the Directors

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Smarter Life aided by Robots

To introduce the importance of mobile technology, the first ever university-wide festival specifically focusing on mobile technology was presented by CityU Apps Lab in January 2015. Exhibition of students’ innovative products, IT career fair and sharing sessions by industry professionals were held throughout the festival.

‘Smarter Life Aided by Robots’ competition in March 2015, is a robotics competition organized by CityU Office of Provost and supported by Apps Lab aiming to encourage students’ innovation in robotic design and application.

Employers'’ Luncheon

CItyU Mobile Technology Festival

Apps Lab Housewarming Party

CityU Apps Lab joined the Hong Kong International ICT Expo 2015 hosted by Hong Kong Trade Development Culture (HKTDC) in April 2015 as an exhibitor in the App Zone Area.

CityU Apps Lab was highlighted in the Discovery & Innovation Gala of CityU’s College of Science and Engineering (CSE) in June 2015, to groom students’ discovery and innovative spirit and encouraging them to create new knowledge.

Finally we have moved in! A housewarming party was held in May 2015 in the new workspace. Support from different university departments as well as external parties like DBS Bank, Sino Group and Chiropractic Doctors Association of Hong Kong (CDAHK) are important in contributing to the success of CityU Apps Lab.

International ICT ExpoDiscovery & Innovation Gala

Pitch & Match Night

January MayMarch

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NEWS FEED

2015

NEWS FEED

20152015

With the aim to enhance new employment, CityU hosted its first Employers’ Luncheon in April, 2015 to strengthen its connections with global and local businesses. Apps Lab sent David Wong and Pluto Mok, to join the luncheon and showcase their achievements there.

A thousand citizens have visited ‘Go Code Exhibition’ 2015 at Olympian City in March 2015, showcasing apps developed by ‘Go Code’ 2014 kids and members of CityU Apps Lab.

NEWS FEED

Go Code Exhibition

CityU Apps Lab has been supportive in incubating innovation and promoting entrepreneurship spirit among youngsters. Aiming to provide a platform for potential entrepreneurs to share their innovative ideas and hunt for talented partners from various backgrounds, the ‘Pitch & Match Night’ was held in March 2015.

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Fostering A New Way of Learning

The graduation ceremony on 5th September 2015 marked the end

of CAL’s first-ever Summer Trainee Program. On the graduation day,

all the teams presented their completed prototype and shared the

barriers and obstacles that they experienced throughout the whole

program. "It’s really an accomplishment when I look back on what I’ve

done in just 5 weeks this summer. I’m amazed by the efficiency of my

group members as we’re able to complete a simple app within the

limited time," said Wai Kit, one of the students who joined the program.

"The traditional way of teaching is not efficient enough to

catch up the rapidly changing technology, lifelong learning

is the key to success in the programming field," said

Nelson, the program initiator, and also a senior developer

at CAL. The program was designed to push participants’

programming skills to a higher level as it requires each team

to develop an app in a short period of time. They have to

coordinate the overall project progress, distribute works

among themselves and be prepared for the presentation of

the completed prototype. "We aim to foster an interactive

learning environment in Apps Lab, where innovation

flourishes and self-excelling thrives. For example, we

encourage learning through team-oriented and project-

based tasks throughout the entire program."

"Being a biology student without strong programming

knowledge, it is very difficult to communicate with my

groupmates when it comes to the technical part, not to

mention involving in the coding process immediately," Maria

expressed her excitement after being able to contribute to

the app their group made, the CityU Run. "Before I can really

start, a lot of self-study is required to pick up the basics

of coding. I find this training program useful and I really

appreciate it as it really drove me to learn new things even

though it is out of my comfort zone."

“Not only did I improve my programming ability, I also

obtained some valuable project management skills. These

are the essential skills that were not taught in lectures, I

am grateful that I am able to acquire them by joining this

program," said Ping, a member from the team working on

“CitySnap”, which functions as the CityU edition Instagram

and won the 'Best Performance Award' among all the

teams. "This is really a good chance for us to have a taste

of an app developer’s life. With the experience accumulated

throughout this training program, we now have a clearer

image about the future workspace and had a deeper

understanding about our real interest.”

CAL Summer Trainee Program

Prototype of “CitySnap”

Cover Story

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To inculcate the concept of programming in youngsters, the Sino Group initiated

a series of coding workshops named “Go Code” since 2014, targeting primary

school students from underprivileged families. In 2015, Go Code expanded its

scale by inviting CityU Apps Lab (CAL) to be its partners.

“School curriculum let children get fundamental computing knowledge but it

is not enough for today’s need,” reflected Ms. Leung, parent of one of the Go

Code participants. “Creativity, which declines with age, is not awaiting and we

don’t want it to be wasted. From the perspective of parents, of course we want

to provide our kids with the best learning environment and let them explore

more in their interest fields. ” added Ms. Leung, who noticed her son’s thinking

pattern becoming more organized and structured in solving problems after

started learning coding.

Sharing the same goal, CAL is going to expand Go Code to a more easy-to-

reach level with Sino Group, so that more children from grassroot families

can get in touch with the latest technology. “We’re impressed by the passion

and leadership Dr. Ray has in promoting coding to different groups of people.

With CAL’s good reputation of its experience in teaching coding and design of

suitable course materials, we hope that children can continue to learn coding

and practise it as a skill in the advanced level,” said Mr Ivan Yau, Deputy General

Manager (Corporate Communications) of Sino Group.

The Coding Journey of the Creators

GO CODE!

Coding Workshops

Initiated by CityU Apps Lab (CAL), Ambassador School Program (ASP) aims to provide support to ambassador secondary schools and primary schools by forming an environment conducive for coding and IT education.

The program connects a partner secondary school with one primary school through the theme of future development, forming a cluster that helps effective knowledge transfer. University students under CAL will be assigned to facilitate coding workshop and coding groups in ambassador schools. Students will benefit from the workshop materials, meanwhile improving their problem solving skills and innovation awareness. The close relationship among CAL and ambassador schools enables effective teaching materials to be prepared according to different levels and aspects so as to improve the students’ learning experience. This eventually enhances the promotion of coding culture throughout all ages, typically in primary and secondary schools.

GAllery of workshopsExecutives Can Code

Android: We Can CodeWe Can Code in Tung Tau Correctional Institution

The Hour Of Code HK

With the great support from Mr. Eric Fok, a mobile app workshop was specially dedicated for a group of professionals from the “Young Executives Club” of Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce in August 2015.

In order to train up a pool of competent project team members and workshop helpers, a 6-week Android workshop were offered to 80 CityU students, helping them to explore and master the essence of Android programming.

The ‘Hour of Code’ was first started by Code.org in US since 2013. Since 2014 December, CAL and Let’s Code started the ‘Hour of Code’ HK campaign, aiming to give everyone a first taste of programming.

CAL cooperated with Hong Kong Correctional Services to initiate an eight-week coding course in Tung Tau Correctional Institution, to provide extra learning opportunity in prison.

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Coding Workshops

Ambassador School Program Cultivates Coding Culture in Primary and Secondary Schools

A new cluster of network that develops synergy among university, secondary and primary schools

Students of Our Lady Of China Catholic Primary School enjoyed an elementary coding workshop in September 2015.

In August 2015, CAL organized a 4-session workshop focusing on Arduino application for the students from St. Joseph College.

The first cluster in ASP, “CAL x St. Joseph College x Heep Woh Primary School“, was officially launched during E-learning Carnival in April 2015.

好知勢

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APPS

‘A recent survey reflected that almost 20% of the

children population in Hong Kong suffers from various

body ache. In fact, a healthy kid should not experience

body ache, hence the public should pay close attention

to this evidently serious issue,’ said Dr. Eric Chu, the

Chairperson of Chiropractic Doctors’ Association of Hong

Kong (CDAHK). In conjunction with World Spine Day 2015,

CDAHK and Children Charity Foundation (CCF) have jointly

organized ‘Let Me Check’ at Central Park on 10th October

2015. It primarily aims to raise public awareness about the

importance of maintaining a healthy spinal as well as to

demonstrate the correct way to prevent spinal injuries. To

show support in preventing the worsening spinal health

phenomenon of our future pillars, Cityu Apps Lab (CAL)

also pledges to devote into this event.

The commencement of the event was honored and

attended by CDAHK Chairperson Dr. Eric Chu DC, CCF

Chairperson Mr. Yu, CAL Director Dr. Ray Cheung, and

famous celebrities as children ambassadors including

Rosanne Wong, Don Li and Eddie Pang. This event

successfully attracted more than 100 kids who were eager

to gain valuable advice on how to protect their backbones

as well as to ensure a right sitting or standing posture.

Many professionals, passionate and dedicated chiropractic

doctors turned up to support this event by providing free

spinal check service to the public. They also offered special

tips on how to avoid spinal injuries. On top of this, the

highlight of this event was the stretching exercise sessions

led by fellow doctors and children representatives.

Participants were impressed and inspired when they

came to realize that through simple exercises, they could

effectively improve their spinal health conditions.

Starting from 2014, CAL and CDAHK collaborated to

develop the Posture Check App, which is now available in

both IOS and Android version for free. ‘Through the app,

we collected and analyzed a total of 370 users’ results.

It shows that half of the children respondents suffer

from spinal health problem. 63% of them experienced

Thoracic Disc Herniation symptom, 60% and 50% of them

experienced leg and neck problems respectively,’ said Dr.

Rick Lau, one of the CDAHK committee members. ‘After

taking the side view and front view of one’s full-body shot,

the app renders an initial posture screen analysis and

evaluate findings for any postural faults. The users could

then share the result to the chiropractic doctors or friends

and families by just one click,’ said Mr. Van Ting, the CAL

Associate Director.

“As prevention is better than cure, we hope to fully utilize

this app to arouse public’s concern on spinal health issue

so that postural faults can be detected before they go

viral,” said Rayne, the developer of Posture Check App

from CAL. He also expressed his gratitude of having the

chance to work on this meaningful project.

World Spine Day Promotes Posture Check App

Financially funded by our University’s Office of EDGE

and technically assisted by CAL, the Crime Prevention

Campaign started well with active participation of over a

hundred of students. “I want our students to have both

inter-disciplinary collaboration within CityU and outside

CityU with the Crime Prevention Unit of the Hong Kong

Police Force. It is exciting to see how students explore

through this learning journey in the campaign, which

results in widened learning horizon,” added Dr. Li. Last

semester, students from Social Sciences formed teams

with Engineering and Creative Media students and

worked on designing mobile apps that help promote

crime prevention message under themes like anti-theft,

anti-stalking, and anti-telephone deception.

“When I knew that we were required to create an app, I was

surprised but at the same time worried about our project,”

said Cindy Hui, a Year 2 Criminology student who had no

related experience in designing and programming. “I have

never worked with Engineering students in my university

life, it seems that social sciences and engineering are two

parallel lines that would never intercept.” By the day her

group showcased their product, she kept expressing her

thankfulness to those engineering and design students,

who worked for CAL, for their generous help in UI design

jobs and programming work.

Dr. Li hoped to move forward from the stage of knowledge

discovery to knowledge transfer in the coming 6 months.

Students are encouraged to make concrete plan for their

ideas and release them to the public. “There are 2 teams

planning to apply for funding to launch their apps in the

market so that the society can benefit from their ideas

and products,” added Dr. Li. “Out of all the proposed apps,

I personally find the idea of identifying counterfeit money

with mobile phone quite ingenious but at the same time

retaining its feasibility. Nowadays, everyone brings along

a phone, so why don’t we make more out of the phones?”

As the 2nd runner up of the Crime Prevention Contest,

Charling Wong, another Year 2 Criminology student,

shared the idea of her group. “Our app is dedicated to

solve the luggage stealing issue at airport and our target

user groups are tourists, business travellers and Hong

Kong citizens. We wish to increase public awareness

about this problem by reminding them not to lose sight

of their luggage when using phone as this would provide

a chance for criminals to convict thefts. We hope that our

app can be available to the public with the support from

CAL,” said Wong. “CAL members are capable of realizing

our brilliant ideas.”

Channeling messages to the public via mobile apps has

become a trend along with the increasing accessibility

of mobile devices. Dr. Li pointed out that CityU might

keep on encouraging colleagues from different faculties

to adopt creative teaching methods collaboratively so

that students can be promised with more crossovers

to work inter-discipline in the future. She found CAL is

an excellent platform for faculties and students across

disciplines to work on their teaching or research projects

in an innovative way.

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Apps ForCrime Prevention

“CityU always supports students and teachers to try on new things,” said Dr. Jessica Li, the

Associate Director (Social Innovation) of CityU Apps Lab (CAL) and Assistant Professor in the

Department of Applied Social Sciences. In line with her research interests in situational crime

prevention, Dr. Li initiated an 18-month project ‘Crime Prevention Discovery Channel’ in 2015.

Across the Disciplines

The more discoveries in cross-discipline project, the more contribution to the community

DBSxCAL TALK

“DBSxCAL Talk” is a whole new platform opened for the young talents and the dynamic industry innovators to get connected. Through continuous sharing of project experiences and ideas, it is hoped to inspire and incubate innovation in our local community. The recent DBSxCAL Talk was held on September 11th, 2015, with the following speakers.

CityU FinTech Teams Headed to Silicon ValleyTwo teams of CityU students and graduates representing CityU Apps Lab were nominated to join Cyberport University Partnership Programme (CUPP) 2015. In collaboration with Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB), this elite pilot programme aims to groom and develop promising young ICT and entrepreneurial talents in Hong Kong. Along with the representatives from other universities, these two teams were sent to Silicon Valley, U.S.A. for an entrepreneurship boot camp from late-September to early-October. They had broadened their horizons in the one-week entrepreneurship boot camp conducted by GSB. Furthermore, company visits to Google, Facebook Headquarters and other companies at Silicon Valley were also arranged.

Asif GhafoorFounder of Spacious

Eric Gnock FahCo-founder of Klook Travel

Gary Alexander McLarenChief Technology Officer of Hong Kong Broadband Network Ltd.

Lewis Cerne Co-founder and CEO of Spacebox

Finding A Great Place To Live Has Never Been This Easy

Smart Travel With Technology Thoughts on Technology and Innovation

On Demand Self Storage At Your Doorstep

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xDBS CAL TALKSmart living with technology

innovation

Saving Lives through Healthcare InnovationText: Dr. Philip Ma, Department of Medicine and Geriatrics, Tuen Mun Hospital * Philip spent one-month holiday working at CAL in the summer of 2015, and now continue to come back to the team from time to time to continue his innovation.

Doctors are often known as restless heroes, battling in hospitals for most of their lifetime, trying to save lives from the scythe of Grim Reaper. These brave fighters also, follow the MSF to deliver love and care to the underprivileged people in the third world countries as Doctors Without Borders. In the public's perception, great doctors must fully devote themselves into the job to save lives by sacrificing their time, and sometimes, their precious lives.

However, history told us that some great doctors succeeded by going through unusual paths: Dr. Eugene Lazowski, a Polish doctor who saved thousands of Jews from the Holocaust in WWII by creating a fake epidemic which played on Nazi Germany fear on hygiene, Christopher Charles, who postponed his hormone

research project, created the “Lucky Iron Fish” to fight iron deficiency anemia in Cambodia, Dr. Philemon Choi Yuen-wan, a local medical doctor, founded the Breakthrough Organization to solve the adolescent problems in Hong Kong. These examples clearly illustrates that thousands of lives could be saved, not by pills, not by surgery, but by the doctor’s in-depth observation, keen insight to social needs and cutting-edge way of invention. These doctors save lives through healthcare innovation.

It is really a privilege for me to work together with talented engineers in CityU Apps Lab. I believe that medical innovation is an absolute priority throughout medical transformation, and more importantly, I am confident that engineering could help to bring and transform medicine sector to a whole new level.

Entrepreneurship

This programme will be continued with the presentation of

ideas and business models by the teams during the “Global

Entrepreneurship Week China – Hong Kong” event at Cyberport

in November 2015. Outstanding teams will each be awarded

with cash prize of HK$100,000 and shortlisted to join Cyberport

Incubation Programme interview.

Let's hear the insights obtained by the team.

Kenny MewCAL General ManagerCityU EE Graduate 2012

Henry ChanPrevious CAL Senior DeveloperCityU EE Graduate 2015

Nelson YauCAL Senior DeveloperCityU Year 4 EE student

Amanda MokPrevious CAL DesignerCityU CM Graduate 2015

Rayne KwokCurrent Intern at Deloitte CAL Senior Developer CityU Year 4 EE student

Raymond MaCAL DeveloperCityU Year 3 CS student

Prof. Baba Shiv (centre) from Stanford GSB gave a lot of inspirations to the teams

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Entrepreneurship

Fear Leads to SuccessThe most mind-provoking thought that I got throughout the whole trip is that successful entrepreneurs are afraid of losing opportunities, whereas ordinary entrepreneurs are afraid of failure.The reason why most successful entrepreneurs are the former ones is because they are willing to try. The courage to try on new things is very essential as we might be able get valuable experience and insights during the trying process. That is what differentiates the winner and the loser.

Embrace Failures Fear is the grave for new ideas. The fear that hid in our unconscious mind made us reluctant to try new things. Most of the time we would halt the creation of new ideas just because we’re afraid of being judged by others if we ever failed. We simply forgotten how it was like drawing on the wall when we were a child, the creativity, as well as the fearlessness of being scolded by mum. We have simply forgotten that failure is actually the most valuable gift in the learning process. It gives us knowledge, experience, confidence for next trial, and help to pave a path to success. One thing I noticed during the trip is the importance of failure and the way to turn failure into a funny experience through some mini exercises. Embrace the learning opportunity, embrace the failures!

The Right Decision It was really a amazing journey to visit Stanford University and experience its lessons. The lessons mainly covered entrepreneurship, ranging from business strategy to VC fundraising. In the past, I have always been told how to make the “right decision”. However, in the lesson about decision-making there, I realise that there is no such thing as right decision indeed. Right decision is an uncertain option that we choose and tune it to the right direction. So, we should rather be fear of losing opportunities, than failure. This trip only lasted two weeks but what I have learned would affect me lifelong.

The Start of Entrepreneurial JourneyIt’s a great pleasure to join the CUPP-Stanford trip to broaden my horizons. I have learnt a lot of business related theories, design thinking and entrepreneurial mindset. The most important point is about how to think out of the box and step out of my comfort zone. By being more open-minded, I believe that I will be able to spot my weaknesses and eliminate them. This would be the starting point of my entrepreneurial journey.

Extraordinary Exposure & RewardsThe Stanford trip is an unforgettable trip with tight schedules and loads of exposure. One of the key concepts I got is that “There is no right decision, but you make the decision right”. We may have had different experiences in life but all of us met challenges. Even though there are ups and downs, we have to be optimistic and confident of the decisions we have made. More importantly, CAL and Dr Ray arranged the visit Google and Facebook and we really had a great time chatting with Bert and Ben from Google, and Jacob Bower from Facebook.

Live without LimitsAs a creative media student, the exposure during these ten days helped me a lot in widening my global view and mastering my knowledge in all aspects. The programs arranged throughout the trip included marketing, business and technical knowledge, which are all totally new to me. The most important things is allowing me to step out of the comfort zone. I might have set a limit for myself in the past by only studying what I am interested in. However, from this moment onwards, I am ready to explore more interesting things in this world!

Thousand thanks to Cyberport, Stanford University, CityU Knowledge Transfer Office and Apps Lab for organizing and coordinating the program.

Before the departure of the journey, the teams were invited for a set-off party, getting inspired from Cyberport executives.

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Industry-university partnershipsClose collaboration and strong connections with industry partners enable CityU Apps Lab to provide students with valuable insights through industry exposure.

The Apps Lab of City University of Hong Kong