Third Space

Bringing a sense of community back to our communities

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Inspiration

There is an increasing lack of Third Spaces (Spaces that "feel like home", separate from home and work, where people can socialise, building and maintaining connections) especially after the pandemic. There is also a "epidemic of loneliness" across a huge variety of demographics, and Mental Health experts believe it is vital to bring back third spaces to increase socialisation within communities.

What it does

Third Space is an app that displays local businesses and locations 3-4 miles away from the user, and allows users to browse based on specific tags ("family-friendly", "pet-friendly", "good for gatherings" etc). When a user clicks on a location, it displays all the tags corresponding to that location as well as a community board with contact details with information about the events that occur at that location on a weekly basis (eg: "Bingo every Saturday night at the local library - phone this number for further details"). Upon visiting a local location, users are encouraged to rate the location and the tags corresponding to it, pushing it up on the app and increasing interaction. We aim to implement in the future a search bar so that users can search for needs outside of tags.

How we built it

We have created a database for our prototype containing location ids (which we ideally would use to determine distance from the user), tags corresponding to each location and votes for each tag. We implemented CRUD to adjust based on user interaction.

Challenges we ran into

It was our first time using Android Studios and so there was a steep learning curve in order to achieve our goals: implementing a database, creating a functioning interface. There was a lot of trial and error, but we are all extremely proud of what we have managed to acheive in a short amount of time and what we have learnt along the way. For our next Wackathon we now have a better idea of how to pace our goals, and what tasks to prioritise over others.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are really proud that we have created a functioning interface, and we have the foundations for creating and updating a database of information which is intregal to our app. Also we are really proud of all of our initiative. We all came back the next day having completed and expanded on our delegated tasks, despite the steep learning curve. It was something we had never done before, so it was really exciting that we were all willing to take on a challenge.

What we learned

We learnt what we were capable of achieving in 24 hours,. Next time, we will have a better idea of which goals to set, what is realistic and how ambitious we should be. We have also learnt the importance of planning and of clearly outlining what foundations we need in place in order to create a good prototype. We have also learnt how to use a new IDE, which originally seemed very daunting.

What's next for Third Space

We aim to utilise Google Maps SDK to create a dynamic map specific to a users local area - approx 3-4 miles User-added tags - If it gets enough votes/interaction, it becomes an official tag, otherwise it can be accessed in “unofficial tags”page Businesses can provide new information or updates about themselves - eg: a new wheelchair ramp or a new event arranged by them We would also like to include an easy-to-follow guide to the app for greater accessibility (which can be skipped), and allow people to find information about their local area through a Guest Account, removing the hassle of creating an account, verifying an email address and logging in However, for users to rate businesses and their tags, they must create an account

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