## Inspiration

Have you ever wished to give a memorable dining experience to your loved ones, regardless of their location? We were inspired by the desire to provide our friends and family with a taste of our favorite dining experiences, no matter where they might be.

## What it does

It lets you book and pay for a meal of someone you care about.

## How we built it

Languages:-
 Javascript, html, mongoDB, Aello API
Methodologies:-
 - Simple and accessible UI
 - database management
 - blockchain contract validation
 - AI chatBot

## Challenges we ran into

1. We have to design the friendly front-end user interface for both customers and restaurant partner which of them have their own functionality. Furthermore, we needed to integrate numerous concepts into our backend system, aggregating information from various APIs and utilizing Google Cloud for the storage of user data.
2. Given the abundance of information requiring straightforward organization, we had to carefully consider how to ensure an efficient user experience.
## Accomplishments that we're proud of
We have designed the flow of product development that clearly show us the potential of idea that able to scale in the future.
## What we learned
3. System Design: Through this project, we have delved deep into the intricacies of system design. We've learned how to architect and structure systems efficiently, considering scalability, performance, and user experience. This understanding is invaluable as it forms the foundation for creating robust and user-friendly solutions.
4. Collaboration: Working as a team has taught us the significance of effective collaboration. We've realized that diverse skill sets and perspectives can lead to innovative solutions. Communication, coordination, and the ability to leverage each team member's strengths have been essential in achieving our project goals.
5. Problem-Solving: Challenges inevitably arise during any project. Our experiences have honed our problem-solving skills, enabling us to approach obstacles with creativity and resilience. We've learned to break down complex issues into manageable tasks and find solutions collaboratively.
6. Adaptability: In the ever-evolving field of technology, adaptability is crucial. We've learned to embrace new tools, technologies, and methodologies as needed to keep our project on track and ensure it remains relevant in a dynamic landscape.collaborative as a team.

## What's next for Meal Treat

We want to integrate more tools for personalization, including a chatbot that supports customers in RSVPing their spot in the restaurant. This chatbot, utilizing Google Cloud's Dialogflow, will be trained to handle scheduling tasks. Next, we also plan to use Twilio's services to communicate with our customers through text SMS. Last but not least, we expect to incorporate blockchain technology to encrypt customer information, making it easier for the restaurant to manage and enhance protection, especially given our international services. Lastly, we aim to design an ecosystem that enhances the dining experience for everyone and fosters stronger relationships through meal care.
## Inspiration

We were inspired by the increasing cost of eating out and the social pressure caused by having to accept such social invitations. We wanted to create a technology-enabled platform where individuals can plan a fun potluck with their friends and family with much of the burden of planning such an event eliminated by having the app plan it all out for you and direct individuals on how to gather and prepare the ingredients.

## What it does

Users can create their accounts with their food preferences selected. Afterwards the potluck 'host' is able to create the event, which generates ingredients and meal preparation instructions. All users are then able to view the ingredients they are supposed to get and how to cook the meal.

## How we built it

We used React for the front end and flask for the back end. We utilized Open Ai API to generate the meal ingredients and preparation instructions.

## Challenges we ran into

Pennapps is the first hackathon for all of our group members and we didn't know exactly what to expect. We also were not all very familiar with developing webapps and fullstack development. We had a lot of issues setting up the project with the appropriate technologies and have them all successfully interact with each other.

## Accomplishments that we're proud of

We learned React and Flask for this project and were able to connect the two sides for a nearly fully functioning webapp. There was a TON that we were not familiar with and we learned so much from the process of creating a webapp that we didn't know before.

## What we learned

We learned a ton about full stack development and how to create webapps. We are in a program that emphasizes the theory behind computer science, but almost none of the practical applications. Therefore, this has been a very wide opening experience for all of us. We have also not collaborated on a project with as many people as we are doing now. It was interesting seeing how we could all help each other out in different ways.

## What's next for LuckyPot

Some group members are eager to continue the project after the Hackathon to further flesh out the idea and possibly turn it into a fully functioning app in production that others could use.
## Inspiration

Over the course of the past year, one of the most heavily impacted industries due to the COVID-19 pandemic is the service sector. Specifically, COVID-19 has transformed the financial viability of restaurant models. Moving forward, it is projected that 36,000 small restaurants will not survive the winter as successful restaurants have thus far relied on online dining services such as Grubhub or Doordash. However, these methods come at the cost of flat premiums on every sale, driving up the food price and cutting at least 20% from a given restaurant’s revenue. Within these platforms, the most popular, established restaurants are prioritized due to built-in search algorithms. As such, not all small restaurants can join these otherwise expensive options, and there is no meaningful way for small restaurants to survive during COVID.

## What it does

Potluck provides a platform for chefs to conveniently advertise their services to customers who will likewise be able to easily find nearby places to get their favorite foods. Chefs are able to upload information about their restaurant, such as their menus and locations, which is stored in Potluck’s encrypted database. Customers are presented with a personalized dashboard containing a list of ten nearby restaurants which are generated using an algorithm that factors in the customer’s preferences and sentiment analysis of previous customers. There is also a search function which will allow customers to find additional restaurants that they may enjoy.

## How I built it

We built a web app with Flask where users can feed in data for a specific location, cuisine of food, and restaurant-related tags. Based on this input, restaurants in our database are filtered and ranked based on the distance to the given user location calculated using Google Maps API and the Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK), and a sentiment score based on any comments on the restaurant calculated using Google Cloud NLP. Within the page, consumers can provide comments on their dining experience with a certain restaurant and chefs can add information for their restaurant, including cuisine, menu items, location, and contact information. Data is stored in a PostgreSQL-based database on Google Cloud.

## Challenges I ran into

One of the challenges that we faced was coming up a solution that matched the timeframe and bandwidth of our team. We did not want to be too ambitious with our ideas and technology yet provide a product that we felt was novel and meaningful.

We also found it difficult to integrate the backend with the frontend. For example, we needed the results from the Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK) in the backend to be used by the Google Maps JavaScript API in the frontend. By utilizing Jinja templates, we were able to serve the webpage and modify its script code based on the backend results from NLTK.

## Accomplishments that I'm proud of

We were able to identify a problem that was not only very meaningful to us and our community, but also one that we had a reasonable chance of approaching with our experience and tools. Not only did we get our functions and app to work very smoothly, we ended up with time to create a very pleasant user-experience and UI. We believe that how comfortable the user is when using the app is equally as important as how sophisticated the technology is.

Additionally, we were happy that we were able to tie in our product into many meaningful ideas on community and small businesses, which we believe are very important in the current times.

## What I learned

Tools we tried for the first time: Flask (with the additional challenge of running HTTPS), Jinja templates for dynamic HTML code, Google Cloud products (including Google Maps JS API), and PostgreSQL.

For many of us, this was our first experience with a group technical project, and it was very instructive to find ways to best communicate and collaborate, especially in this virtual setting. We benefited from each other’s experiences and were able to learn when to use certain ML algorithms or how to make a dynamic frontend.

## What's next for Potluck

For example, we want to incorporate an account system to make user-specific recommendations (Firebase). Additionally, regarding our Google Maps interface, we would like to have dynamic location identification. Furthermore, the capacity of our platform could help us expand program to pair people with any type of service, not just food. We believe that the flexibility of our app could be used for other ideas as well.