Inspiration
With remote work being the new normal, communication is more important than ever. However, it's often difficult to switch between multiple windows and apps to communicate with teammates. Enter VIAduct. VIAduct serves as a bridge between users anywhere on the internet. When you’re collaborating on a project (Google Docs for example), you and your teammates can simply open the extension and communicate without the hassle of opening another app like Slack or Discord.
What it does
VIAduct is a Chrome extension that allows you to chat with your friends from anywhere on the internet. Whether you’re collaborating on a Google Doc with a classmate or need a game chat, VIAduct is for you.
How we built it
The Chrome extension is built with React. The chat uses a Deno server and websockets.
Challenges we ran into
We ran into build issues with Deno and it was hard to debug. It was also a bit hard to understand Deno, coming from a background of basic knowledge of Nodejs.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
Our team is proud of working outside of the box and, instead of a standard website or app, programming a Chrome extension—which may not be as common as other innovations— and successfully debugging and running a successful chatroom. We are also fond of how our live chat was one of our most complex and challenging coding projects, yet we were able to successfully program it to function properly.
What we learned
With one of us not having much experience beyond simple websites and apps, our team entered the hackathon as nothing but passionate, curious high-schoolers who are eager to create and innovate. We discovered that skills and experience aside, the most important factor is passion and creativity.
What's next for VIAduct
It would be more useful to have VIAduct be a bridge between an existing popular chat platform. For example, Ripcord is a client for Slack and Discord. Viaduct could be similar and essentially serve as a “bridge” in a way that allows you to send and read Slack or Discord messages inside a chrome extension.
To try it out, click on the link to install the zip. Open chrome://extensions and enable developer mode. Then, “load unpacked” and select the dist folder. You could open 2 browser windows and try out the chat.
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