Inclusions of ICT skills, digital literacy and open source platforms in the teaching of industrial design applied to smart agriculture

This paper talks about how ICT (Information and Communications Technology) skills and digital literacy combined with open source platforms and low-cost electronics like Raspberry formed the basis for writing a Master's thesis on Product Design at the IUAV University of Venice. The thesis concerns smart agriculture. The agricultural sector has a strong impact on the environment. Among the most critical elements is the use of pesticides, which harm the biodiversity of the area. The tools of the 4.0 viticulture system, digital connections and IoT (Internet Of Things) systems, make it possible to prevent diseases, parasites and general nutritional deficiencies that could affect the vineyard, as well as having a picture of the health of the plants. In this way, the correct rates of fertilizer can be defined and acted rationally only where and when necessary. Thus, production processes are optimized, improving their quality and making them more sustainable from an environmental point of view. The project proposes an innovative solution: a rover-quadruped which, thanks to the acquisition of data from multispectral and hyperspectral cameras, monitors the biotic and abiotic stresses of the vine and at the same time fertilizes in a rational way. Being four-wheeled and four-legged, it is not limited by ground-level obstacles such as hill slopes and has the ability to transform into a four-wheeled robot or a four-legged mechanical animal as needed. It makes its flexibility its winning weapon: with its legs it moves easily on difficult terrain and with the wheels it runs quickly on the flat stretches between the rows of the vineyard. The project development process began with in-depth research on the topic, visits to wineries, definition of the concept and development of a prototype running with Raspberry Pi. The use of open source platforms, low-cost technology and information technologies have facilitated and speeded up the process of democratizing knowledge and developing the project. The development of the working prototype was supported by the use of rapid prototyping. An open-source project of a quadruped robot was assembled and disassembled, already accessible as a case study functional to the construction of the basic knowledge of the project both at hardware and software level. The electronic components already present and immediately usable have been re-assembled on the Raspberry Pi as an open-source platform that makes programming the board quick and functional to training on the subject in a short time. Likewise, the codes downloaded from the Github community and the laser-cut and 3D printed mechanical parts have allowed the creation of more training prototypes in a short time. Some mistakes were made along the way of assembly and disassembly but these were an important part of the learning progress. The diffusion of low-cost electronics and easy access to knowledge of ICT technologies allow students to creatively tackle the difficult scenarios of robotics. The integration of raspberry and open source learning was essential to create a working prototype useful for verifying the functionality of the proposed solution. Given the results obtained at the educational and design level, this paper demonstrates that the inclusion of ICT skills, digital literacy and open source platforms in the teaching of industrial design helps young designers to expand their creative skills in problem solving.