foodBuddy

Foodbuddy: Manage your ingredients, get personalized recommendations for food and exchange your extra ingredients and experiences with your dorm-mates!

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Inspiration

Coming for college is an exciting experience. We are waiting to join an exciting world. Every year there are more than 900k international students. Not to mention, all the students living in the dorms or who move out of state for better education and opportunities. Sometimes it can become lonely and daunting. Also, lot of students are not familiar with cooking, nor with managing their groceries and money. We end up over-spending and over-purchasing groceries. Or sometimes we end up eating out or on-campus. And often we end up wasting food. Or sometimes, we crave to eat a particular dish, but the ingredients needed for it are sold in bulk. Or we simply run out of ingredients. Inspired by our experiences FoodBuddy was born. FoodBuddy addresses the need for a more sustainable and community-driven approach to college life.

What it does

FoodBuddy has three main functionalities.

  1. Tracking Kitchen Inventory: Managing your kitchen inventory has never been easier! The app enables you to keep a digital record of all the ingredients you have in your kitchen. You enter food items in the inventory with their expiration date.. This feature ensures that you'll never accidentally use an expired item again, and prevent items from going bad, reducing food waste and saving you money.
  2. Personalized Recipe Recommendations: Say goodbye to the struggle of deciding what to cook. Foodbuddy employs analyzes the ingredients you have on hand and then generates personalized recipe recommendations based on your available inventory and the quality of items. It takes into account your dietary preferences and restrictions, offering you a range of creative and delicious recipes to choose from. This feature not only simplifies meal planning but also encourages you to experiment with new dishes.
  3. Connecting with Dorm-Mates: Foodbuddy goes beyond being just a kitchen organizer; it's also a social platform for culinary enthusiasts. The app allows you to connect with your dorm-mates and nearby students who are also using the app. This opens up the opportunity for ingredient sharing and exchange. If you have an excess of an ingredient, you can offer it to others, and if you're in need, you can check if someone nearby has what you're missing. This community-driven approach reduces costs, minimizes food waste, and fosters connections among students.
  4. Crossplatform Compatibility : FoodBuddy is designed to be accessible and user-friendly across multiple platforms. We offer both a Webapp and a Mobile App, providing users with flexibility and convenience in managing their kitchen life. With our web application, you can access FoodBuddy from your desktop or laptop. This option is ideal for when you're planning your meals, reviewing your inventory, or connecting with dorm-mates while working on your assignments. Mobile App: For on-the-go convenience, our mobile app is available on both iOS and Android platforms. Whether you're at the grocery store, in the kitchen, or in a friend's dorm room, you can effortlessly access your inventory, check recipe recommendations, and connect with others. The mobile app offers a seamless and optimized experience for your smartphone or tablet.

How we built it

  1. FrontEnd: We built the website based on React. Creating a seamless UX.
  2. MobileApp : We have a user sign in interface, page to view your inventory, and a page to display the recommended recipes with the steps for preparation, calories and macros.
  3. Backend: The backend was built with Django, and we integrated cosine similarity with NLP techniques (tfidf) for building the recommendation system. We established communication using RestAPI. ## Challenges we ran into One of our main challenges was creating a secure and efficient ingredient sharing system within a tight 24-hour timeframe. Ensuring data privacy and developing real-time communication features proved to be complex, and we regretfully couldn't implement the chat interface as planned. Despite these challenges, we've gained valuable experience and are committed to further enhancing FoodBuddy for the future. ## Accomplishments that we're proud of We are proud to have developed an app that addresses a real need for college students. The achievement lies not only in creating a functional solution but in contributing to a more sustainable and socially connected college experience. We feel proud to have developed this interface within the limited timeframe applying all that we have learnt.

What we learned

During the development of Foodbuddy, we learned valuable lessons about app development, the importance of sustainability, and the power of community. We also improved our skills in implementing real-time features and fine-tuning recommendation algorithms.

What's next for Foodbuddy

We would like to introduce Dorm feature, where you can securely log in your dorm community. We would also like to create an algorithm that looks up recipes online and is able to filter them based on cuisine and also get pictures of these recipes. We would also like to implement a buddy matching, where people with similar taste can get connected. The journey doesn't end here. Foodbuddy's future involves expanding its user base, introducing new features, and collaborating with more colleges and students. We aim to make Foodbuddy a go-to platform for reducing food waste, culinary inspiration, and fostering meaningful connections within the college community.

Github: https://github.com/Mckenz31/foodBuddy

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