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SMS notifications
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Email notifications
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Inspiration
Most of us have family members spread across the globe and we realized the challenges of staying abreast of trends and cases for family members who aren't nearby. We wanted a convenient way to track this, and thought that in addition to a dashboard with data visualizations we could allow daily text and email notifications to give users a targeted digest.
What it does
The app has a LOT of functionality! It includes customizable data visualizations of the US at large, and we intend to expand that with time. You have customizable subscriptions that inform what daily email and text alerts you get - we envision people using this to get filtered statistics on the spread of cases and the outcomes from them in the areas where their loved ones are concentrated.
How we built it
Our team utilized Python & Flask for our server side code with a MongoDB no-sql database hosted on Mongo Atlas. The frontend was built using context, React Hooks, React, and the Material UI component library. We were in the midst of deploying to GCP when an unfortunate deployment hiccup caused us to change our plans to meet the deadline.
Challenges we ran into
This was actually our second idea - our first was completely different and we spent most of day one granularly planning our approach. We found out APIs we planned to use had an approval process that meant we wouldn't even get access until after this event had concluded so we had to completely switch gears.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
We all really respected each other's hustle and talent in getting this as far as we did. Especially given that we lost several hours planning for a project we sadly had to abandon, I respect our grit in rallying behind this new idea, and executing it so crisply. We worked together really well and the collaboration was excellent. I think we are most proud of our resourcefulness and work ethic in getting this done. We also were passionate about the idea once it occurred to us. We do personally have family scattered across the country and globe and so this app solves a problem that is real for us as human beings. We think it would solve a real problem for many others as well.
What we learned
So much! I think we all gained better understanding of Plotly, Twilio, Flask, React, and the limitations of a couple big name APIs that weren't going to give us access in time to even get API data before the event end.
We are all actually local developers and I think we learned a lot about each other as teammates. We have plans to continue working on this application and polishing it afterwards so it was a really rewarding experience and we learned a lot about each others' strengths.
What's next for CoronAlert
We are polishing the current MVP and deploying it, and then adding multiple countries! We have collaborators with family abroad and that's the next huge hurdle. I think this project really captured all of our interest deeply and we have intent to stick with it and make improvements.
