BiteWise

Inspiration

This idea was inspired when we realized that we have all had a time when we did not remember how long we had left food in the fridge and whether our food was expiring. This was especially common with food like fruits, bread, milk and vegetables. This is where the idea for BiteWise was born!

What it does

This web app allows the user to take pictures of different grocery items; using our self-trained AI, our application will be able to sort the foods and generate an expiry label. The grocery items will then be sorted in different carts (depending on the day the pictures were taken) and the user can check the labels to see when their food is expiring. Best of all, our homepage shows the food expiring soonest and at the click of a button, the user can be shown potential recipes using the expiring food as ingredients to ensure that it is not wasted.

How we built it

We built our project using Python for the backend, React for the frontend, and an AI that we trained to identify different foods.

Challenges we ran into

We ran into many challenges, such as finding an API that would suit our needs. Having our AI properly discern different foods. Etc. We also had trouble finding a database that shows expiry labels for different food items. Thus, we had to create our own.

What we learned

We learned about the organization of the tech stack, how to collaborate on GitHub, and the importance of clarifying how backend functions should be used when applying them to the frontend. We also Iearned how to optimize project structure, adapt quickly to mitigate challenges, and how to select appropriate frameworks and tools based on the requirements of our project. One of our teammates, who is new to software development, also learned how to read JSON files sent from our API and create functions using the relevant information. They even learned how to create and use a database for the purposes of this project

What's next for BiteWise

As a team we would like to continue developing and improving this web application as we believe that it can be very helpful for a wide variety of people and can help diminish food waste.