Tag-Along

Main User Interface

Inspiration

University life involves much more freedom and Tag-Along doubles as a tool for users to not only share their ambitious plans for hangouts, but also:

Grow your social circle
Makes it easier to ask many friends to hang out at once
Can be used for studying, going to the gym, going to school events/clubs, grocery shopping, etc.

What it does

If you're planning to go out and do something in a little bit, mark it on Tag-Along.
Friends will be able to see your marker on the map and join you if they please

How we built it

Tag-Along is made using the React framework, but is programmed in TypeScript instead of the traditional JavaScript to facilitate stricter type-checking. To style the front-end, we used Tailwind CSS for speed and convenience. In terms of our backend, Firebase was used for easy Google Authentication and for their cloud database, Firestore. Additionally, to generate and display maps, we used MappedIn's API and SDK. Their indoor maps were very detailed, shown by their intricate floor plans of E7 which we used.

Challenges we ran into

Using new technologies. This project exposed us all to several tools we've never touched before. For instance, we initially wanted to use Next.js but eventually decided we didn't need its added functionality and stuck with just React. Although there were certainly setbacks, we also ended up learning tons of tech which we will surely revisit in the future.
Incorporating MappedIn SDK into our project. The MappedIn team only released this SDK for public use a few months ago, so it's no surprise there were a couple issues we encountered while integrating it. However, once we got it working, we were impressed by how detailed and customizable the maps were. The SDK provided numerous features, including precise indoor mapping and smooth navigation, which fit seamlessly into our project.
Sleep Deprivation. Although pulling all-nighters seemed like a good idea at the time, we definitely paid the price later on.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Completing our initial goal. We set an ambitious target and worked hard until we accomplished it, which is certainly something worth being proud of.
Working as a team. Although we've never worked together before, we still did a good job communicating and tackling difficult problems together.

What we learned

Later on in the Hackathon we encountered some design and architecture issues that could've gone a lot smoother had we planned them out earlier. Next time we'll try to avoid last-minute decisions by spending more time at the beginning discussing them.