Development of a Remote Operational Amplifier iLab Using Android-based Mobile Platform

iLabs are experimental setups that can be remotely accessed through the Internet using a web browser. They allow students and educators to carry out experiments from remote locations anywhere and at any time. Globally, more than a dozen iLabs have been developed and deployed. However they all collectively suffer from an increasingly important oversight: their interfaces are developed for desktops and laptop computers. This is considered an oversight because there is substantial evidence that mobile devices are emerging as the form factor of choice in the near future. This paper describes a completely functional Android-based mobile Operational Amplifier iLab that will enable students all over the world perform experiments remotely from a mobile device using the Android platform. There are already other mobile platforms on the market today. However, Android is an environment that combines an open, free development platform based on Linux and gives good access to hardware. Android allows users to explore the mobile Internet afresh with its new features, easy access to the Internet, ease of development, new services and application. This makes it easy for a user/client to interact with the iLabs Service Broker and perform experiments. Android's openness and flexibility makes it a deciding factor over the closed iPhone framework that provides a similar set of features. This work serves as an improvement to the earlier research and work done in the area of mobile Laboratories under iLab.