RootShare

Inspiration

I was introduced to worker owned cooperatives about 7 years ago. The company I had just applied to work at was looking to transition to one. I was not familiar with cooperatives at all before that and one thing that I have found to be a concern across most of the cooperatives I've worked with and had conversations with is having a way to really interact, call for votes, and have discussions. There have been some apps that have worked well enough for some of these, but not really anything for all the different ways a cooperative would interact. I wanted to create a place where all cooperatives could create groups, have conversations, cast votes and even post polls. I also wanted to be able to create a directory of cooperatives where anyone, not just coops, could look for businesses local to them that can serve their needs while also working for the greater good.

What it does

RootShare is an all in one app that allows a cooperative to create a group, or even multiple groups, have discussions within those groups, offer up polls and even cast votes on important matters. RootShare also provides a way to store important votes and discussions with search and filter options to locate these things easily if they need to be referred back on. Cooperatives can have several groups with different members so that sub-committees can work on things without members that aren't part of those being bothered by lots of messages and notifications that don't concern them. Then the sub-committees can bring what they have worked on to the rest of the members in the main group where polls or votes can be cast as needed.

How we built it

The app was started and primarily built with Bolt.new. VS Code (with Copilot) was used for fine tuning some things.

Challenges we ran into

The version being presented here is the 3rd version. The first attempt just didn't work out, but it did have a very nice UI that I copied into the second and then this final version. The second version was coming along nicely about 5 days into the hackathon when I was made aware of the rules clarifications. I had started and gotten the bulk of the build done in Bolt, but moved to VS Code to add Google OAuth and MongoDB as those don't function inside of Bolt, at least not with the Next.js project I created. When I found out the final project did have to function inside of Bolt, I scrapped v.2 and started v.3. I am most familiar with Next.js as a language so that is what I used to create this version. After getting the basics all set up, I attempted to use Supabase for authentication and storage since that's what Bolt.new is integrated with. That's when I found out that Supabase is not compatible with Next.js inside of Bolt.new. At that point I really didn't want to move to a v.4 so I chose to use internal json storage and authentication for this application. The application does run fully inside of Bolt.new. Using internal storage was a struggle itself, but I managed to make it work. This is where some of the fine tuning happened in VS Code with Copilot. The final challenge was getting the app deployed. No matter what I tried, I was not able to get the app deployed in Bolt.new. I struggled using gcloud as well, but was finally able to build and deploy the app to the web.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

In spite of the app using internal json storage, the group creation, polls, votes, discussions and even discussion replies are all fully functional in the app. This project ended up being a solo project, and while I reached out to some mentors for some issues I came across, the app is built solely by myself. Granted I leaned heavily on the use of AI with Bolt.

What we learned

Verify all the rules and regulations before getting started and make sure you have all the information needed before starting your project. When using a tool like Bolt.new, make sure you know what languages and things work best within that tool.

What's next for RootShare

RootShare will likely get picked up by my company and revamped with an actual authentication and database. We would like to make it available to local cooperatives and begin to spread the word to more cooperatives around the world. Who knows, maybe it will become the best know cooperative app out there!

Built With

• bolt
• bolt.new
• gcloud
• next.js
• vscode