Events Screen of our website showing an event for a tech conference. It also shows the attendees who rsvp'd for the event.

Inspiration

We were actually inspired by being uninspired. That is, being bored and not knowing what to do about it. Our goal was to create something that would allow people to connect with others while simultaneously solving the tragedy of boredom. We thought of it as a crossover between a social media app and all those spam emails you get advertising various events in your area.

What it does

TownTalk takes the input of a city and displays to the user events that are happening in the coming days in that area and allows you to RSVP. Additionally, you can search for your friends' profiles on the website and see what events they've attended, and maybe even a photo or two of them there.

How we built it

We used Supabase and PostgreSQL, which is an open-base firebase and is used for authentification and other database capabilities. For an API, we created our own using hypothetical city data, since we could not find an API that suited our needs well enough that we would be able to effectively implement. For framework, we used svelte-kit to make it easy to combine front-end and back-end work. For front end work, we used Figma for some designing, and then wrote HTML, CSS, and JavaScript directly to create the final designs.

Challenges we ran into

Originally, we developed our UI using Figma, however we ran into trouble while implementing the corresponding HTML with our existing Javascript code and database work. To get around this, we manually created all the HTML pages seen within the website, and implemented our own CSS as well, while taking inspiration from our previous Figma design. Another challenge we ran into was finding an API that suited our vision for TownTalk. When we couldn't find one that worked, we created our own, sacrificing a bit of functionality for a result more suited to our vision for the product.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Implementing a working database is the accomplishment we're most proud of. The database allows us to follow other uses, so we used a many-to-many relationship and created a function that could create a new entry in a follower list, generating a follower's ID and following ID.

What we learned

From brainstorming, to creating, to backtracking and recreating, we learned the importance of planning throughout this project. Sometimes, we planned ahead well and implemented features smoothly, while other times we ended up losing time to backtracking and solving avoidable problems. We also improved our front-end skills, and learned how to combine front-end and back-end to create a fully functioning website.

What's next for TownTalk?

Given more time to work on this project, we would implement a dashboard/feed that allows users to see activity of people they follow, including what events they have attended or are planning to attend. Along with this would be the ability to view others' profiles directly, including their activity and followers. We also would add a Review feature, that allows users to leave reviews about various events, attractions, venues, etc. that they've attended.