Inspiration
As students it is very difficult to find a study space within the library, especially during exam times. We wanted to develop a program that can help students save precious time and energy by providing real-time data of free seats within the library. Not only can this work in libraries, but can also be implemented within any crowded venues and other public spaces.
What it does
The interactive website allows users to view available seats in public spaces, specifically libraries, in real time. In addition, they are able to reserve a seat for a maximum of 15 minutes prior to arriving to the location. If the user is sitting in the location for too long, the program will prompt them to get up and move around in order to promote a healthy lifestyle.
How we built it
Our project is built on 3 main components. Adruino hardware is used to simulate seats and pressure sensors, and from this, we can retrieve the information of which seats are occupied. This information is read by a Python program through the serial inputs, and the program sends the information to Firebase to store it in the cloud. Thus this allows us to work with real time data wirelessly. Finally, this information is then used by a Javascript program to modify the website designed using HTML and CSS.
Challenges we ran into
The most difficult part of the project was thinking of an idea that could directly impact our lives.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
The accomplishment that we're most proud of was successfully sending the information using firebase and changing the colors of the seats on the website.
What we learned
The new concept that we learned from this hackathon was using the pyserial library which allows a python program to access a device's serial ports. This connected the Arduino hardware to our software and enabled inputs to be read.
What's next for Take a Seat
Future features that can be implemented include adding gps maps and accessibility features.
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