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Inspiration

We were driven by a desire to prioritize mental health and saw an opportunity to leverage Hume's emotion analysis API to provide an innovative journaling platform. Music has a profound connection to mental health, and rather than developing a chatbot, we wanted to focus on a service that could offer emotional support. Personalized music recommendations based on journaled emotions could inspire users and help them feel understood and less alone.

What it does

HeartStrings is a unique platform blending emotion-driven journaling with personalized music recommendations, offering users a deeper connection to their mental and emotional well-being. It uses Hume API to detect and analyze emotion in users' journal entries, tracking the emotional timeline through a calendar feature and providing Spotify playlist recommendations catered to the writer's current feelings.

How we built it

We utilized Flask and SQLite for our backend, storing journal entries and associated moods. The Hume API was integrated to analyze text journal entries and detect prevalent emotions. For the frontend, we employed HTML and CSS to create a user-friendly interface displaying our features. The Spotify API, combined with keywords generated from detected emotions, allowed us to recommend corresponding playlists. Our team divided the work as follows:

Shreya and Akshitaa worked on the frontend and UI, ensuring a seamless user experience.
Prath handled the integration of the Hume API, focusing on accurate emotion detection.
Virali managed the Spotify API integration, ensuring relevant playlist recommendations.

Challenges we ran into

Tech Stack Selection: Deciding on a feasible yet innovative tech stack within a 24-hour period was challenging. Project Feasibility: Choosing a project topic that was both achievable and unique enough to innovate on existing technology required careful consideration. UI Design: Creating an appealing and intuitive UI presented design and implementation challenges. Efficient GitHub Use: Collaborating effectively using GitHub and debugging our code was essential and sometimes problematic. API Integration: Integrating the APIs smoothly posed significant technical challenges. Target Audience and Purpose: Defining a clear target audience and purpose for our project was crucial to its success.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We take pride in our ability to effectively divide tasks while maintaining collaborative problem-solving when needed to ensure the success of our program. Setting and meeting time constraints for individual tasks was another achievement, along with resolving many merge and Git conflicts through collective effort within our timeframe. Additionally, we are proud of developing this web app and successfully integrating an API that we were previously unfamiliar with into our project, and adding innovative features to expand on its functionality.

What we learned

Throughout the project, we encountered numerous learning opportunities:

API Integration: We discovered the complexities involved in integrating multiple APIs, particularly the Spotify and Hume APIs.
Project Management: The importance of effective project management and work division became clear as we navigated tight deadlines.
Git Workflow: We became proficient in using more advanced Git commands and workflows, essential for collaboration.
UI Design: Designing an intuitive and appealing UI using CSS and Figma was a significant learning curve.
New Tech Stack: Using Flask and SQLite for the first time introduced us to a new tech stack and broadened our development skills.
Adaptability: We learned that project ideas could evolve rapidly, requiring decisiveness and flexibility.

What's next for HeartStrings

Looking ahead, our immediate focus includes developing a mobile app to make journaling and music recommendations more accessible on-the-go. We're also excited to introduce audio and video journals, leveraging Hume API's voice emotion and expression analysis for deeper emotional insights. Improving Spotify music recommendations is another priority, refining our algorithm to deliver more specific playlists that resonate with users' current emotional states. We plan to enrich the platform with therapeutic content such as guided meditations, mindfulness exercises, and practical tips for well-being, enhancing its supportive role in users' mental health journeys. To deepen user engagement, we aim to provide advanced analytics for deeper mood insights and trends, allowing users to track their emotional patterns over time. Lastly, user personalization features will be expanded, allowing individuals to create profiles and customize their experience with tailored preferences for music, journaling prompts, and notifications.