## Inspiration

We wanted to use Livepeer's features to build a unique streaming experience for gaming content for both streamers and viewers.

Inspired by Twitch, we wanted to create a platform that increases exposure for small and upcoming creators and establish a more unified social ecosystem for viewers, allowing them both to connect and interact on a deeper level.

## What is does

kizuna has aspirations to implement the following features:

* Livestream and upload videos
* View videos (both on a big screen and in a small mini-player for multitasking)
* Interact with friends (on stream, in a private chat, or in public chat)
* View activities of friends
* Highlights smaller, local, and upcoming streamers

## How we built it

Our web-application was built using React, utilizing React Router to navigate through webpages, and Livepeer's API to allow users to upload content and host livestreams on our videos. For background context, Livepeer describes themselves as a decentralized video infracstucture network.

The UI design was made entirely in Figma and was inspired by Twitch. However, as a result of a user research survey, changes to the chat and sidebar were made in order to facilitate a healthier user experience. New design features include a "Friends" page, introducing a social aspect that allows for users of the platform, both streamers and viewers, to interact with each other and build a more meaningful connection.

## Challenges we ran into

We had barriers with the API key provided by Livepeer.studio. This put a halt to the development side of our project. However, we still managed to get our livestreams working and our videos uploading! Implementing the design portion from Figma to the application acted as a barrier as well. We hope to tweak the application in the future to be as accurate to the UX/UI as possible. Otherwise, working with Livepeer's API was a blast, and we cannot wait to continue to develop this project!

You can discover more about Livepeer's API [here](https://livepeer.org/).

## Accomplishments that we're proud of

Our group is proud of the persistance through the all the challenges that confronted us throughout the hackathon. From learning a whole new programming language, to staying awake no matter how tired, we are all proud of each other's dedication to creating a great project.

## What we learned

Although we knew of each other before the hackathon, we all agreed that having teammates that you can collaborate with is a fundamental part to developing a project.

The developers (Josh and Kennedy) learned lot's about implementing API's and working with designers for the first time. For Josh, this was his first time implementing his practiced work from small projects in React. This was Kennedy's first hackathon, where she learned how to implement CSS.

The UX/UI designers (Dorothy and Brian) learned more about designing web-applications as opposed to the mobile-applications they are use to. Through this challenge, they were also able to learn more about Figma's design tools and functions.

## What's next for kizuna

Our team maintains our intention to continue to fully develop this application to its full potential. Although all of us our still learning, we would like to accomplish the next steps in our application:

* Completing the full UX/UI design on the development side, utilizing a CSS framework like Tailwind
* Implementing Lens Protocol to create a unified social community in our application
* Redesign some small aspects of each page
* Implementing filters to categorize streamers, see who is streaming, and categorize genres of stream.
# Nexus, **Empowering Voices, Creating Connections**.

## Inspiration

The inspiration for our project, Nexus, comes from our experience as individuals with unique interests and challenges. Often, it isn't easy to meet others with these interests or who can relate to our challenges through traditional social media platforms.

With Nexus, people can effortlessly meet and converse with others who share these common interests and challenges, creating a vibrant community of like-minded individuals.

Our aim is to foster meaningful connections and empower our users to explore, engage, and grow together in a space that truly understands and values their uniqueness.

## What it Does

In Nexus, we empower our users to tailor their conversational experience. You have the flexibility to choose how you want to connect with others. Whether you prefer one-on-one interactions for more intimate conversations or want to participate in group discussions, our application Nexus has got you covered.

We allow users to either get matched with a single person, fostering deeper connections, or join one of the many voice chats to speak in a group setting, promoting diverse discussions and the opportunity to engage with a broader community. With Nexus, the power to connect is in your hands, and the choice is yours to make.

## How we built it

We built our application using a multitude of services/frameworks/tool:

* React.js for the core client frontend
* TypeScript for robust typing and abstraction support
* Tailwind for a utility-first CSS framework
* DaisyUI for animations and UI components
* 100ms live for real-time audio communication
* Clerk for a seamless and drop-in OAuth provider
* React-icons for drop-in pixel perfect icons
* Vite for simplified building and fast dev server
* Convex for vector search over our database
* React-router for client-side navigation
* Convex for real-time server and end-to-end type safety
* 100ms for real-time audio infrastructure and client SDK
* MLH for our free .tech domain

## Challenges We Ran Into

* Navigating new services and needing to read **a lot** of documentation -- since this was the first time any of us had used Convex and 100ms, it took a lot of research and heads-down coding to get Nexus working.
* Being **awake** to work as a team -- since this hackathon is both **in-person** and **through the weekend**, we had many sleepless nights to ensure we can successfully produce Nexus.
* Working with **very** poor internet throughout the duration of the hackathon, we estimate it cost us multiple hours of development time.

## Accomplishments that we're proud of

* Finishing our project and getting it working! We were honestly surprised at our progress this weekend and are super proud of our end product Nexus.
* Learning a ton of new technologies we would have never come across without Cal Hacks.
* Being able to code for at times 12-16 hours straight and still be having fun!
* Integrating 100ms well enough to experience bullet-proof audio communication.

## What we learned

* Tools are tools for a reason! Embrace them, learn from them, and utilize them to make your applications better.
* Sometimes, more sleep is better -- as humans, sleep can sometimes be the basis for our mental ability!
* How to work together on a team project with many commits and iterate fast on our moving parts.

## What's next for Nexus

* Make Nexus rooms only open at a cadence, ideally twice each day, formalizing the "meeting" aspect for users.
* Allow users to favorite or persist their favorite matches to possibly re-connect in the future.
* Create more options for users within rooms to interact with not just their own audio and voice but other users as well.
* Establishing a more sophisticated and bullet-proof matchmaking service and algorithm.

## 🚀 Contributors 🚀

|  |  |  |  |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [Jeff Huang](https://github.com/solderq35)  | [Derek Williams](https://github.com/derek-williams00)  | [Tom Nyuma](https://github.com/Nyumat)  | [Sankalp Patil](https://github.com/Sankalpsp21)  |
## Inspiration

The moment we formed our team, we all knew we wanted to create a hack for social good which could even aid in a natural calamity. According to the reports of World Health Organization, there are 285 million people worldwide who are either blind or partially blind. Due to the relevance of this massive issue in our world today, we chose to target our technology towards people with visual impairments. After discussing several ideas, we settled on an application to ease communication and navigation during natural calamities for people with visual impairment.

## What it does

It is an Android application developed to help the visually impaired navigate through natural calamities using peer to peer audio and video streaming by creating a mesh network that does not rely on wireless or cellular connectivity in the event of a failure. In layman terms, it allows people to talk with and aid each other during a disastrous event in which the internet connection is down.

## How we built it

We decided to build an application on the Android operating system. Therefore, we used the official integrated development environment: Android Studio. By integrating Google's nearby API into our java files and using NFC and bluetooth resources, we were able to establish a peer to peer communication network between devices requiring no internet or cellular connectivity.

## Challenges we ran into

Our entire concept of communication without an internet or cellular network was a tremendous challenge. Specifically, the two greatest challenges were to ensure the seamless integration of audio and video between devices. Establishing a smooth connection for audio was difficult as it was being streamed live in real time and had to be transferred without the use of a network. Furthermore, transmitting a video posed to be even a greater challenge. Since we couldn’t transmit data of the video over the network either, we had to convert the video to bytes and then transmit to assure no transmission loss. However, we persevered through these challenges and, as a result, were able to create a peer to peer network solution.

## Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are all proud of having created a fully implemented application that works across the android platform. But we are even more proud of the various skills we gained in order to code a successful peer to peer mesh network through which we could transfer audio and video.

## What we learned

We learned how to utilize Android Studio to create peer to peer mesh networks between different physical devices. More importantly, we learned how to live stream real time audio and transmit video with no internet connectivity.

## What's next for Navig8.

We are very proud of all that we have accomplished so far. However, this is just the beginning. Next, we would like to implement location-based mapping. In order to accomplish this, we would create a floor plan of a certain building and use cameras such as Intel’s RealSense to guide visually impaired people to the nearest exit point in a given building.