One-Stop-Ottawa

One-Stop-Ottawa acts as a central hub of information to access all the recreational activities happening in Ottawa.

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Inspiration

Our inspiration for this project was to somehow find a way to convey as much from the data set provided by the Hackathon organizers into something presentable to a general audience. The team felt there was a very common theme among the data provided was a lot of recreational areas the city had, and hence the name for One-Stop-Ottawa was coined.

What it does

OneStopOttawa is basically a website and an app which enables tourists manly or people new to Ottawa to find resources they might need. There is everything they might need from outdoor fun to transportation to food. OneStopOttawa serves as a central point for information pertaining to Ottawa to save people from going to a lot of websites for information pertaining to Ottawa. This is a base application which has basic functionality. We intend to add more features and options to it to make it more useful to everyone.

How I built it

OneStopOttawa first started off as a mobile app which enabled you to find outdoor activities. After a few hours into development we realized the potential of OneStopOttawa and decided to expand it into a complete central information hub for Ottawa. We developed the website using HTML and attached the developed website to an Android web page project to make it an app.

Challenges I ran into

  • The first major challenge the group came across was first attempting to read the data provided. The formats of CSV, XML, JSON, KML were all extremely foreign to us. Our initial aim for building the android app from the ground up depended on our ability to parse the data which we unfortunately failed to do. We did find one solution with CSV using MySQL
  • Utilizing MYSQL Workbench we managed to parse the data into an SQL database, however, since the final product needed to be uploaded to an online service to run, we had to utilize Cloud9. Unfortunately Cloud9 had its own unique ways that demanded many trial and errors to figure out.
  • Again with cloud9, our inital pHp script to connect to an SQL database via Cloud9 was also unconvential which led to the point where everyone had to abandon the database and deal with pre-made data to have something done for submission.
  • Working on the website itself that needed to be very appealing to the eye left our minds extremely boggled at the diverse CSS scripting demanded.
  • The final challenge was uploading the project itself onto the cloud with heroku which was especially unfriendly with our project. Thankfully, the stars aligned with Algonquin College themselves providing a server that students can upload projects to that was a safe last resort to get the website up and running.
  • And lastly, miscommunication among group members who aren't physically present did lead to even further hiccups.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

  • The first and biggest accomplishment is the fact that a whole project managed to be submitted. Although the core functionality didn't pan out, the vision is still visible that was completed within the time frame allotted while simultaneously tackling all the other life responsibilities the group must deal with. The team understood what we were capable of and scaled the final project down to something that can finally be presented.
  • When the initially planned methodology for solving the problem doesn't work out, the group still managed to use a wildly different method to achieve it like when the JSON parsing within Android studio wasn't working out with our current skillset, we managed to figure it out using CSV and MySQL shifting development to a pHp web site.
  • And mostly, our favorite accomplishment has to be our experience in exploring so many different languages pHp, mySQL, Java and IDE's ranging from AndroidStudio, Cloud9, and others simultaneously to gauge ways to make ends meet.

What I learned

  • We gained a lot of experience and knowledge in applying MySQL to a legitimate application and the extra care that comes with dealing with its challenges.
  • We learned the powerful tool that is Cloud9 and the ability to upload such projects directly onto a free server that can come in very handy in the future for quick prototypes and business pitches.
  • We learned how imperative it is to plan ahead with formatting web pages to know how the CSS pages will pan out and will prevent conflicts later into the program that potentially destroy the entire formatting.
  • And since there was so much miscommunication, proper task delegation among group members that involves the least amount of coupling between us as possible will be very beneficial for future projects.

What's next for OneStopOttawa

We plan to expand on OneStopOttawa by adding more features and options. We want to expand the information set in OneStopOttawa and not make it dependent on other applications and websites. Our main focus is on building a website that is also very easy to navigate and fast with information access for everyone. We plan on expanding to other cities like Toronto and Montreal to create central information hubs for them to prevent people from looking too far for information pertaining to the city. This would enable us to change OneStopOttawa to OneStopCanada.

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