Virtual Multiplex

Everything is better together

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Live app

https://virtualmultiplex.web.app/

Note

This app only work in mobile browsers (better in chrome browser).

Inspiration

We often love watching movies or videos on the Internet with family and friends. Be it in a theatre or at home, watching with others makes it more enjoying. But because of the pandemic and social distancing norms we are away from many of our loved ones.

This is why we have come up with the idea of a virtual environment where people living far away from each other can watch movies and videos together that are perfectly synchronized. They can chat and communicate with each other while watching the video. The aim is to provide a virtual environment to people where they feel like watching movie in a theatre with others like old times, without actually having to go outside.

What it does

Using this app you can watch any video, say from YouTube or any video in google drive and watch it with others. Even if they are being played on different devices, the videos will be synchronized with real-time communication.

After you sign up on the app you can join a room (if you have the invitation) or create a virtual room. On creating the room you have to choose a video to play. A room link is generated. You can share the link with any number of people. On opening the link a person can enter the room and together you can watch the video at the same time while chatting with others in the room. When the host pauses plays or fast forwards the video the same is done for all devices in the room instantaneously.

How we built it

Frontend is built using HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Bootstrap is used to make it more responsive. Most of the functionalities are built using firebase which handles the backend. Firebase web sockets are used to synchronize videos on different devices.

For user verification, log-in and sign-up firebase authentication is used while the real-time database stores information and chatting purposes.

Challenges we ran into

The biggest challenge was to find the right method to play synchronize videos without making the process complicated or having to rent a server.

We also had to keep in mind to minimize time lag between videos on different devices which is one of the keys to our project.

Firebase provided us with affordable and efficient solution for these problems.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We were able to create a user friendly lightweight app that can bring together family and friends living away from each other and enhance their watching experience.

What we learned

We learned to use firebase for this project. It is our real time database and handles the backend for our app. We also learned to play videos on multiple devices in a synchronized way. We came across many libraries and frameworks like bootstrap that made our frontend more attractive.

What's next for Virtual Multiplex

We are going to add voice communication feature for users using VoIP to make the experience even better.

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