Math. Equation Evaluator (MeE)

Mathematical Equation Evaluator is a mobile based student guiding application which is specially designed for local ordinary level students and advanced level students who are working in the different contexts related to complex mathematical formulas.
The present process of solving complex mathematical problems is, writing down the mathematical formulae and simplifying them for solving the problem easily with a lesser number of variables. Assigning the given values to the final formula and calculating the final answer or the value by using a scientific calculator in step by step are the last two steps involved.
The developed mobile application Mathematical Equation Evaluator system will eliminate the complexity and delays in the manual solving of the complex mathematical equations. The system users can enter the mathematical equation to be solved (or to be simplified) via the camera of the mobile phone in to the system. First the system will identify the equation string and detect the variables and the constants. Then the users can enter the known values for the variables in the equation. Finally, the system will generate the answer for the equation, with the step-by-step explanation displaying how the system has calculated the answer.
The application is to be used by students after they have worked out the problem for answers. The application will show the answer and the steps of reaching the answer for the student to verify the result of the calculation attempt. In addition to that, the teachers can use this application to buildup answer scripts for mathematics papers.
The most important feature of this project is the capability of inputting the equations via the mobile phone camera. Then, the students can scan the equation via the camera attached to the phone and evaluate the equation easily and quickly. Optical Character Recognition technology is used in implementing the above.
Complex mathematical equations are solved by using predefined mathematical equations (axioms) and by simplifying the given equations in to smaller terms or simplifying the given equation to have lesser number of unknown variables. In this stage, it is required to follow a large set of steps to find the correct answer.
Previously, a paper based system and calculators were used in solving the equation. But it’s not efficient and can lead to errors, because, the equation to solve and values are on a paper and the calculations are processing in the calculator. There is more possibility to occur mistakes in data entering to the calculator from the paper and vice-versa. In addition to that, it will consume more time in doing the calculations.
Another aspect that leads to difficulties in mathematical equation solving is that, for some mathematical equations, it’s not provided a correct answer with it. Therefore the students and lectures may get confused with different potential answers.
Then, some of the complex mathematical equations need using recursive methods in solving the final equation. So the person who is doing the calculation will be bored with the calculation task, and such long and recursive calculations are having a higher risk of getting incorrect evaluations during the intermediate steps.
The developed solution, Mathematical equation evaluator is a mobile application, targeted for mobile devices and tablets (with Android operating system). This application aims to provide solutions to above mentioned problems that are faced by students in learning mathematics. The application summery is as follows.
There are two types of information gathering techniques using by the application for receiving input data in to the system. First technique is capturing the equation via mobile device’s camera and system automatically detecting the equation by using the OCR technology and the second technique is manually entering the equation details in to the system.