In 2023 I was invited to give a lecture on human evolution at our local high school (Liceo Bertrand Russell). In that occasion I developed a digital presentation with the open source tool impress.js and Strut, using the open material of the exhibition "Facce. I molti volti della storia umana" and integrating a webapp done with Odyssey.js, o create an interactive journey through hominid fossils, linking their geographical locations with the forensic facial reconstructions we realized at Arc-Team.
Fast forward to today: I had to give the same lesson, so I decided to dust off that old project, but as often happens with "vintage" web code, it was broken.
The Power of Open Source AI
To bring the project back to life, I experimented with OpenCode, an Open Source AI application. The process was surprisingly smooth; the AI helped me refactor the legacy code and fix the dependencies that had broken over the years.
This sparked an idea: why keep this resource on a local drive when it can still serve a purpose?
Introducing "r_evolution"
I’ve created a new GitHub repository called r_evolution. It’s a simple, functional web app where you can explore the map of human evolution and see the facial reconstructions of our ancestors.
Live Demo: https://lucaarcteam.github.io/r_evolution/r_evolution.html
Source Code: Check it out on GitHub (feel free to fork!)
A Call for Collaboration
Currently, the app is in Italian, as it was born for a local context. However, in the spirit of Open Research, I would love for the community to help:
Translate the content into English (or other languages).
Update the data with newer fossil discoveries.
Improve the code for better mobile compatibility.
It was great to see students engaging with these reconstructions once again. It’s a reminder that Open Source isn't just about the tools we use today, but about the "digital stratigraphy" we leave behind—and how easy it is to revive it when the foundations are open.
Stay Open and have a nice day!
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| The r_evolution webapp |
