VanConnect

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  Login/Landing Page

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  Swipe/Home Page

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  Chat Page

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  Calender Page

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  Settings/Prefrences Page

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  Events Page (WIP)

Inspiration

Students struggle to coordinate people, schedules, and places, and sustainable choices in daily social life aren’t always clear. VanConnect makes it easy to connect while encouraging environmentally conscious decisions.

What it does

VanConnect matches students into small groups for indoor and outdoor activities, suggests sustainable locations, and provides a shared chat with an AI assistant for planning and eco‑friendly tips.

How we built it

Built as a full‑stack web app using Next.js + React, MongoDB Atlas for data, and Gemini API for the in‑chat sustainability assistant.

Challenges

Designing simple but meaningful matching, making AI useful, balancing indoor/outdoor, and ensuring a smooth demo under time pressure.

Accomplishments

Working match → group → chat → AI flow, sustainability built into core features, clean UX, and meaningful use of MongoDB + Gemini.

What we learned

Simple systems work best, sustainability should be embedded, grounded AI is more useful, and strong UX/demo flow is critical.

What’s next

Real impact tracking, smarter matching, more eco‑locations, real‑time coordination, and expansion beyond Vancouver.

Built With

• css
• gemini
• javascript
• mongodb
• next.js
• node.js
• react
• tailwind
• typescript
• vercel