EcoScan: My First Hackathon Project

This past weekend, I participated in my first Hackathon at SF Hacks @ SFSU 2024. The theme was the City Life Challenge, which focused on finding innovative solutions to problems encountered by urban communities daily. We went through three phases in this incredible journey.

First phrase (Grid): Friday 4pm-12pm.

At the start of the Hackathon, we faced an unexpected setback when two teammates couldn't make it, leaving just Hoang-Anh Tran and myself. I pitched a mobile app that scans items to assist in sorting recyclables. Despite our efforts to set up the development environment all night, we hit a wall. Faced with these technical hurdles, Hoang suggested pivoting to a different concept. The struggle was real; we were adrift and at odds, unable to find common ground on the project direction.

Second phrase (Progress): Saturday 10am-10pm.

Early on Saturday morning, we wandered through San Francisco's streets, discussing our inspiration for pursuing computer science and the obstacles we encountered in our studies and job searches. This dialogue drew us closer and deepened our mutual understanding. Back on campus, we resolved to commit fully to our original concept and see the project through. With the help and guidance from Jatin Agrawal and Raymond Thai, we settled on using Node.js and Fireworks.ai as our tools. Hoang-Anh created a starter webpage, to which I added a photo-taking feature. Hoang then enhanced it with dual-camera functionality. She successfully called an API from the server side, while I handled the data transmission from the front-end to the server. Hoang processed the data returned from the API. Our collaboration was seamless.

In this day, the most amusing incident was when I, in a bout of nerves, accidentally spoke in Mandarin, which left my Vietnamese teammate looking at me in total surprise. The highlight, however, was my family's visit, which provided me with immense support.

By 10 PM, we had successfully completed the main functionality of our project. We were elated and proud, convinced that we had the best team and project. I would like to extend my gratitude to Hoang-Anh Tran for pulling an all-nighter to design the UI and make our website stand out. You truly are an exceptional UI designer!

Third phrase (Harvest): Sunday 9am-3pm.

We returned to campus to focus on completing our documentation and video presentation. At the moment we submitted the project 5 minutes before deadline, the relief was overwhelming. It felt like a significant achievement, a commitment fulfilled to ourselves. It was also an enormous surprise that we won two prizes: Most Innovative Use of Verbwire API and Best Use of Fireworks.ai.

Please check out project: https://devpost.com/software/ecoscan-pz96vj

Our only regret is that we were so focused on completing our project that we had little time to learn from other teams and make more friends.

Again, I want to thank all the mentors, organizers and judges who made this journey possible. Thank Parth Panchal Juan Estrada xu gu and my family Ruijie He for encouraging us. Last but not least, thank my friend Hoang-Anh Tran for supporting me and be a wonderful teammate!