Inspiration
Hackathons are amazing because they bring together so many people that are passionate about computer science. But when you look outside of the hackathon world, you often find a lack of excitement and fervor for CS. Why is that? Probably because most middle and high school students aren't even exposed to the world of CS until after graduation, if at all. We wanted to create a fun app that both entertained fellow coders who appreciate being a little silly, while at the same time finding a way to help bring computer science to more schools so that our community can continue to grow.
What it does
Twerk For Tech is an iOS app that allows you to challenge your friends to a twerk-off, bet them that you'll win, and do a short twerk to a random song. The loser (most twerks per 10 seconds, with bonus points for rhythm) automatically donates the bet amount of money to the Raspberry Pi Foundation, a group pushing for education in all public schools.
How I built it
We used iBeacon to connect two iPhones near each other together and coded in xCode using Swift. For the login and registration system, we used Parse. To calculate the score for twerking, we used the accelerometer in the iPhone. Finally, we used CapitalOne's Nessie API to link user's bank accounts to our app so that they can donate to the cause seamlessly.
Challenges I ran into
Coding the iBeacon was definitely the hardest part, and even once the phones were linked up, perfect connectivity was hard to achieve. Also, syncing the music that plays during the dancing was tricky because the two phones needed to play it at the exact same time.
Accomplishments that I'm proud of
Our team worked so incredibly well together during the entire course of this project. Considering the fact that only two members knew each other ahead of time, it was amazing how easily we got into the swing of things without quarrels. I'm also psyched that we had enough time to make the app not only complete but also accomplished some bonus features, such as the winning phone vibrating during the dance.
What I learned
Everyone on the team got to work on something new. Some of us had never touched iOS before, but by the end we were cranking out the front end with ease. Others had never used Photoshop or APIs before, and we got great exposure with both of those.
What's next for Twerk For Tech
Our team would love to put Twerk For Tech on the AppStore soon so that we can start generating real profit to start helping fund computer science education.
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