Give visibility to local businesses
Super Cool Logo
The iOS App and the Swift Code
One company on the web app
The list of the nearest companies
Filtering the companies around you
Map, showing all the companies around
Home page of the Web Page, for companies
Profile Editor for Companies
Initial diagram of the Mobile App
Some HTML code
Some Python code for the Django Server
With the economic implications of the virus, a huge number of small businesses, local companies and agents will face very hard times. For most of them, activity is partially stopped and it will be extremely hard to sustain the incoming months. We want to offer these businesses the opportunity to get visibility via an application and a web platform.
Local businesses can create an account using the web platform, where they can:
give information on how to contact them, and generic information about the company (including localisation)
specify their activity (what they can do, what they can not do)
specify how one can help them
There is a mobile app (first in iOS, as a proof of concept) where users can
see all the referenced businesses near them
get in contact with them
use a 'feed-like' page where they can share / comment their favourite places
give constructive feedbacks to the companies directly
How is it made
(vici.myftp.org)
The website has a simple structure:
Presentation Page: presentation of the project (marketing)
Business Interface: interface to create and edit an account
It is made with HTML, JS and CSS code.
This page contain:
Acces to FAQ
Access to Terms and Conditions
Access to Customer Service (our contacts for the moment)
Business Interface
This page allows businesses to create and edit an account via a form where they can choose what information they wish to share with the public.
What businesses can share:
Description text
Cathegory (grocery, services, supermarket)
contacts, opening hours
How they were affected by the virus
What services they still offer
How people can help their business
We offer the users an application where they will see all the referenced companies around them, either on a list or on a map. The application shows a detailed description of all the companies, as it was created on the website, and offers additional functionalities such as contacting the companies and sending them feedback. Users can also create accounts for themselves, to have favorites companies for instance. Users can look for companies or sort them.
As a proof of concept, the app has been done in swift (open source language done by Apple for iOS deployment), However, we have the skills do to the same app afterward for Android deployment as well.
The application was very performant at the end, there are only two things that we intended to do, and that we couldn't at the end:
The API to create account wasn't working
The API to create comments wasn't working. Also, we didn't have time to finish the implementation of the filtering fonctionality, but all the UI was coded and only the actual coding sorting wasn't perform. It is a question of minutes to do it, but this hackathon was a question of minutes...
App Structure
The app has 4 main pages: - Map - List of businesses - Favourites - Basic Settings
And those pages can send to a 'company page' where to see the detailed description of the company - Page Business Profile - Description of what business chose to share (see Business Interface above) - Feedback from users (comments and ranking)
Here are some inspirations that we had for the UI of the app.
TooGoodTooGo
Cashyou
For all of this to work, especially for the communication between the website and the mobile users, there is a server that was coded in Python using the Django framework. This work is not really 'visible' however it is a requirement for all the rest to work well.
The server is hosted on a raspberry-pi and is accessible by the web.
Feedback on the work
This weekend was very intense. We had lot of coding to do and we are very proud to have made 99% of it work. In the time allowed for the weekend, we did :
create a user-friendly, and smooth application in swift (which was entirely coded since Friday night by Arthur and Marin, the two brothers)
create a user-friendly website to create new references (coded by Lorenzo and Jonas)
create a server in Python, a communication API and set all of that on a Raspberry-PI that is accessible on the web (later, we should not use the R-PI but for the time allowed we didn't find any other alternatives) to store all the companies created on the website, stores all the accounts, and display them on the application (done by Johan) All was tested and working !
Furthermore, the entire project isn't just about coding ! There was lots of Graphic Design, lots of thinking about what we want to offer, a huge work for the legal aspect of the project and finding potential companies that would be interested by the project. All those aspects were done by Sarah, Anne-Aimée and Leonardo !
Finally, the project involved a LOT of coordination and communication. It was a 'coding-success' and we are still very interested to know if this project could actually be implemented for real. There are still many things to be done in order to have a fully deployable application, including
creating a real server (not set on a r-pi)
deploying the iOS app for real (that also means to clean the code a little bit and make it more robust)
coding the same app in Android
adding many more features for the user experience and on the website
A note for the tester
So far, the app is not deployed (only the code is, see GitHub links below). However, if anyone is interested it would not be difficult to set up a 'fly' version of the app easy to send, for testers. This feature could be done if the project is selected to keep going. And if that is the case, there are some of us ready to stay on the future team !
Last Note
It was great to do this weekend and we sincerely hope that all this code and all the work that we did will actually serve something bigger than simply the love of coding !
LauzHack Against COVID-19
Arthur Bricq
Marin Bricq
Johan Félisaz
Lorenzo Jacqueroud
Sarah Michel
Anne-Aimee
Leonardo Mussa
Jonas T. Ulbrich
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Lorenzo Jacqueroud posted an update — Apr 06, 2020 09:18 AM EDT
Website (frontend)
All the code for the frontend side of the website is done. It is functional and companies can register through a form to create an account, and from there add all the info they want to be seen by a user on the application. We have an "about the project" page, and the language change is now functional for english and french.
*Website (FrontEnd) The html and css parts of the website are almost complete. The only missing parts are a few paragraphs of text on the "about the project" page, and the css for the "edit profile" form. Once this is complete, it will be ready to be put online.
Arthur Bricq posted an update — Apr 05, 2020 04:47 PM EDT
Synchronisation Mobiles Server
The synchronisation between the server and the mobile is now working and works as follow:
No static cache on the phone, but a dynamic one
Fetching data asynchronously (was really hard to do, because fetching the data was freezing the UI, also because of the high quality of image that was making the all thing very slow)
When the user scroll down, app detects there is not much data to be showed, fetch some more and the user doesn't even detect it.
For the rest of the night : I want to make a bad ass ui, and i want to sleep 5 hours.
Arthur Bricq posted an update — Apr 05, 2020 06:08 AM EDT
Hopes for the day
By tonight, we would like to have
completed the structure of the swift app
competed the forms to reference new companies online
have a working connection between the app and the server
It's a lot of work but we can do it ! If we do it, tomorrow will be done to
Make the app prettier than ever
Finish server-side security coding
Debuging of all functionalities (takes time!)
Johan Félisaz posted an update — Apr 05, 2020 05:54 AM EDT
What has been done so far
The 'list companies' and map features are done, along with the login / create account page.
Home page and login/create account page done, interfaces correctly with the backend
Website (Backend)
Database setup, API operational, and authentication working
Arthur Bricq started this project — Apr 03, 2020 06:04 AM EDT