With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, schools and colleges over the world had to send students back home and shift to online mode of learning. Same was the case with Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani (BITS Pilani). A sudden shift to an online mode of learning brought upon many challenges to the students and teachers. One of the most difficult categories of courses to be conducted online was the Laboratory related courses, which require understanding the procedure to conduct an experiment. Reading the steps described in the manual is not enough to understand the experiment. Students require a feel of what the equipment looks like, how are they operated, what readings to note. Keeping this in mind, and to continue the effective learning of the course “Chemistry Laboratory”, we introduce Virtual Lab (VLAB).
VLAB is a desktop-based GUI application developed using Python and a GUI toolkit called PyQt. VLAB provides an interface to perform the experiments virtually, where animations, walkthroughs, and virtual simulations have been used to provide a good degree of similarity to on-site laboratory equipment. Keeping in mind the point of view of a teacher, features such as secure access and a submission portal have been implemented.
VLAB is an important dimension added to the teaching at BITS Pilani, as it will not only be a helpful tool of learning throughout the online classes but will also serve as an aid to practice experiments when we shift back to the offline mode of study.
All kinds of contributions to improve the source are welcome! You can initiate a patch here.
This project is currently licensed under the MIT License.