Plant Health API

Executive Summary

An API (Application Programming Interface) is a set of rules and protocols facilitating communication and interaction between different software applications. This report documents the creation of a Plant Identification API aimed at assisting farm workers in promptly identifying various plant diseases. The challenge revolves around the lack of early identification of plant diseases on commercial farms, leading to unhealthy harvests. The Plant Identification API aims to provide farm workers with a tool to identify issues and implement solutions early on, preventing crop loss.

Project Overview

Background/Inspiration : A visit to a cannabis farm in Upstate New York revealed widespread crop health issues due to unidentified deficiencies. Prompted by this, the Plant Identification API was conceived to aid farm workers in recognizing and addressing plant diseases efficiently.

What is the problem? The core challenge addressed is the development of a specialized Plant Identification API to tackle prevalent plant diseases encountered by farm workers.

Project Timeline: 11/29/2023 - 12/06/2023
1. Creation of Plant API HTML page and Postman Account
2. Inclusion of JSON and Axios Packages (on Replit)
3. Understanding of APIs, identifying goals, and overall knowledge
4. Creation of Plant ID API account through web.plant.id
5. Writing out the JavaScript code
6. Writing out the Plant Identifier HTML code
7. Troubleshooting & Testing

Factors Considered: Identify the type of API and specific information needed. Conduct thorough research on relevant API machine learning services. Understand JavaScript coding for creating desired functions and fetching information.

Recommendations: Explore different API machine learning services. Research JavaScript coding for required functions and data fetching. Clearly define goals and purposes of the API. Conduct extensive troubleshooting and testing.

Rationale for the suggested actions: Support recommendations through comprehensive research, experimentation with existing APIs, and hands-on exploration of possibilities

Project Analysis

Contributing Factors to the Issue: Lack of information on plant diseases and deficiencies. Absence of standard operating procedures for observing and addressing plant abnormalities.

Strengths and Weaknesses Strengths include convenience and accessibility of APIs for quick issue identification. Weaknesses involve a lack of guaranteed accuracy, with results based on specific data.

Steps Taken Learned about JSON, Axios, APIs, Postman, and machine learning integration. Identified goals for fetching data. Executed troubleshooting, debugging, and testing.

What concepts have you learned from Change Food For Good’s Intro to AgTech course apply to your case? Through Change Food for Good’s Intro to Agtech Course, we have learnt about the need of technology in agriculture which includes how to create and API, code for fetching data of plant information and relevant functions and how to identify and create products to fulfill the needs and wants of clients.

Results

API Outcome: The API successfully identified plant issues, provided additional information, and suggested treatments, exceeding initial goals.
API Goals: The API not only met but exceeded goals by offering comprehensive information and diverse treatment options.

Conclusion

Future Improvements: Expand API functions to include mushroom identification. Research additional machine learning services for better server comparison.
Project Recommendations: Consider credit limitations (100 credits) and potential fees for API usage rights.
Project Takeaways: Acknowledgment of technology's impact on sustainable agriculture, coding's role in API functions, and the effectiveness of teamwork in achieving client goals.