RUDating | Devpost

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Inspiration

We've used other dating, and while they all have their ups and downs, there isn't one that provided consistent chatting with other users. We wanted to make a platform where chatting is the main appeal! We aim to revolutionize dating on the Rutgers campus!

What it does

Users create a profile by submitting their name, phone number and picture. They then fill out a quick visual questionnaire and they are ready to be matched! Once two users are matched, they are placed in a chat room where they have 2 minutes to speed date. The platform provides an icebreaker topic to help start the chatting. By the end of the 2 minutes, both users receive a sentiment score, and make a decision on whether they want to "match".

How we built it

We used python with flask for our backend, with Google Cloud Datastore for the database and Google Cloud Storage for the storage buckets. The chatroom and matching was done with socket.io, and the entire frontend was built with React and semantic-ui.

Challenges we ran into

We had never previously used websockets before. In order to set up the private chat rooms, we had to figure out a design that would allow our matching algorithm to match any 2 users and then add them to a websocket room without compromising privacy. Additionally, it was very difficult to debug any issues related to websockets.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're proud of the idea, the design, and how we managed to implement a chat app inside our project during this hackathon. The chat app was the hardest part to implement, since we decided to build it ourselves instead of using an existing library.

What we learned

None of us knew how to use flask or sockets, so we were able to learn a lot about these two technologies during this hackathon. Additionally, we learned the importance of design before implementation.