Opiq's web-based e-learning environment lightens backpacks around the world

Project Opiq began in 2013, when Antti Rammo, CEO and founder of Opiq, started to prototype a solution of digital textbooks for Avita publishing house with Hendrik Väli, the creative director of Opiq. Soon they realized that the platform they are prototyping will have a bigger purpose than they thought at first. After that, the goal was to give the students and teachers a convenient, exciting, interactive and modern tool for studying, which would fully replace paper-based textbooks and workbooks, while also serving as a study journal. As a bonus, Opiq would drastically reduce the weight of school bags and would also enable the students, parents and teachers to manage schoolwork at any location and on any device.

The platform is designed for conducting and assessing the study process between the students, teachers and parents in the most productive, convenient and modern way possible.

From the beginning, our priority has been end-user satisfaction with the product. We are developing the product using agile development practices: adopting the forever-changing business needs and customer requests. We started with the functionalities of the highest priority and we are still expanding them continuously. In the beginning, the development cycles were short (2 weeks), now the development cycles are as long as necessary: ranging usually from 2 weeks to 5 weeks. The releases are planned together with the customer – that way we can provide a solution fit for their needs. The customer can monitor and give feedback throughout the development process.

During the development, we follow the principles of Test Driven Development and Domain Driven Design. As Opiq is a cloud application, it is hosted in Microsoft Azure cloud. It uses Azure storage and has a strong search engine built on ElasticSearch. We use continuous integration with TeamCity and Bitbucket to store the source code. Project management is carried out in Pivotal Tracker which includes code reviews.

Opiq is a digital learning environment that makes learning easier for students. For example, students can search for a topic to revise from last year or to study something extra about it from the next year’s curriculum. Opiq has a strong search engine that helps to find all the materials where a certain topic has been mentioned. There are self-assessment tasks for students so they can test their knowledge.

For teachers, there is automatically checked homework. This helps to cut back on the time it takes to check homework. Teachers can make different tests depending on the need. They can check the answers themselves and give feedback with comments instead of grades.

School administrators can manage users and their licenses for both teachers and students. Publishers can add new books and manage learning kits.

When students from all over the world had to isolate and stay at home, we in Estonia already used Opiq. Still, the user base of Opiq grew exponentially, but increased demand was handled with flying colors. Opiq is a scalable highly available service, with an uptime of 99.99%.

It is used in most Estonian schools but has also a market in Finland, Kazakhstan, Kenya and Uganda and there is a plan to conquer more and more international markets.

• Opiq contains professional study materials from publishers and enables teachers and students to share the materials they make themselves.
• The materials in Opiq are engaging and interactive. There are illustrations, videos and more.
• Opiq can be used on different devices – so that studying, assessing and giving feedback can be done in any location.
• Design follows the needs of the study process, nothing is excessive. Design can be individually adapted based on the wishes of a teacher, a student or a parent. Any excessive and misleading noise is excluded and the focus is on the content. Hence the study process is more effective.
• Powerful search engine, which works just as well and follows the same principles as Google search. The search is quick and delivers all the correct answers.
• Smart assessment system – the teacher can assess certain content automatically. Saves the time of the teacher.
• Precise, quick and personal feedback from a teacher to a student or a parent and the other way around. The student sees the feedback right next to the exercises – so it is easy to see what can be improved.
• Data protection is important to us and Opiq complies with GDPR.

Accessible at https://www.opiq.ee/ 
Opiq - From Textbooks to Digital Learning Environment | Trade Estonia