Comet Compass

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  log in page design

Inspiration

When I started at the University of Texas at Dallas as a transfer student, I had a lot of trouble navigating the resources and information I needed. There was a different website for everything, and a lot of information was hidden, and you couldn't find it unless you knew exactly what to search for. I felt like I was going into everything blind. In my second year at UT Dallas, I became a mentor in the Transfer Mentor Program, hoping to help be the guide I needed when I was a new student. I compiled notes on everything I learned about UTD and my first-hand experience with how everything worked. I was inspired by how Nebula Labs took notice of the lack of user-friendly student resources and created websites for students by students that made tedious processes, like building a good schedule, so much faster and easier.

What it does

Comet Compass is a one-stop onboarding hub that guides new students through every step of starting at UTD. From getting their Comet Card to registering for classes with checklists, student-written tutorials, a personalized calendar, and all the hidden resources in one place.

How we built it

This was built using Figma to design a prototype. Then coded APIs into VS Code.

Challenges we ran into

My biggest challenge was navigating the Nebula API. I had only basic JavaScript experience from an intro class and had never worked with an API before. Understanding how to use API keys, and display real course information was completely new to me. The documentation was helpful, but translating it into working code took a lot of trial and error. Also time was a constraint, as a solo developer, managing time was intense and I had to constantly prioritize what features were essential versus extra elements i wanted to add.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

I'm proud of starting something that solves an issue current students, including me, are always struggling with. I'm also quite proud of my basic design and interface.

What we learned

Having a smaller, working app is better than a badly-built ambitious one. Prioritizing saved my project. Moving from Figma to code is about extracting visual language, not copying CSS

What's next for Comet Compass

I hope Comet Compass becomes more personalized in the future. I want the site to have tabs for the different schools at UTD, offering resources specific to each one. For example, JSOM provides unique benefits like a certain amount of free printing and access to a free Quinncia account. I also want to customize the site for each user. This could mean guiding them from onboarding to a graduation checklist over time and recommending resources based on their progress or major.

Built With

• api
• figma
• javascript
• python