MotivateMe was a team submission for the CalgaryHacks hackathon held in February, 2021, designed and created by myself and the 2 members of my team. We were inspired by online communities such as r/ucalgary on Reddit and @uofconfessions on Instagram, that incorporate humor and light-heartedness into information that's pertinent to the general university experience, such as study tips, course information and deadlines, living on residence, etc.
Our website is a responsive system that has links to other sites and to its webpages. It is based on resources that we personally have found to be helpful as we have all made the switch to working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was built entirely using HTML, CSS and Javascript, and we used Atom's Teletype feature to collaborate in real-time.
Personally, the fact that we did all our work remotely was quite the challenge, but my greatest hurdle was working on creating our webpages from scratch using these languages that none of us had extensive experience using, all in only 48 hours. An accomplishment that I'm proud of regarding this project is the fact that it works almost seamlessly, and it affords me a pleasant user experience when I use it myself.
CHALLENGE STATEMENT:
"How might we create social transformation that shifts users towards greener behaviour and sustainable practices?"
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I carried out UX Research by creating and disseminating a questionnaire, to gather data that I could base the design of the mobile prototype on. Analyzing the data allowed me to come to the following conclusions:
I further concluded that the implications of this data were that the main function of Scrappy had to be education, both on the definition of 'composting' and on how it works (especially to combat climate change). Other important functions would be providing locations of facilities (since respondents that do compost rely on their city's facilities) and composting methods. These functions had to be the focus of the design process since most of our survey respondents did not compost food waste or know where to take their food waste to if they did decide to compost it. Lastly, since 83.3% of survey respondents were between the ages of 18 and 24, I assumed that they were familiar with and knowledgeable about mobile applications and websites. This was therefore not a significant consideration in the design of the prototype.
The ThriftboX app works in conjunction with physical “thrift boxes”-these are boxes similar to conventional mail boxes or clothing donation bins, which store second-hand clothing items and accessories that users of the app physically put into them. The ThriftboX app gives users the ability to locate the thrift boxes closest to them, view pictures and descriptions of the items located in each box (inputted by users on site, when putting items in the box) and get directions to the box’s location. Users gain points when they complete purchases and challenges, which are updated in the app every month and/or week, and these points cause them to level up when certain point values are reached. The app also provides a description of what Fast Fashion is, which is always available to view by users. Users can also edit their accounts at any time using the app.
We hope to motivate and incentivize users to make better choices in their daily lives in various ways using the app (buying clothes second-hand to curb use of water, about and fossil fuels used in normal production of clothing, presenting boxes located closest to walking-distance first at all times when the search feature is used, and incorporating a points and levels system to make the user experience more enjoyable and engaging).
The most challenging aspect of completing this project for me was working remotely in a very short period of time- my teammate and I were admitted into the competition several days after it had officially begun; we had been on the waitlist before then. As such, we had very limited time to complete our submission, and having to complete the high fidelity prototype separately (in 2 separate Adobe XD files) was quite the challenge and led to a few minor design inconsistencies.
An accomplishment that I'm proud of regarding this project is the fact that we were able to conduct real User Research and create a polished high-fidelity prototype in the limited amount of time that we had to work with, and I was able to improve my overall User Experience design skills!
The most challenging aspect of completing this project for me was learning how to use new technologies such as Firebase and JavaScript for the first time, and in a competitive setting. Most of my team members were also learning things for the first time, and so we were able to lean on each other's strengths to support the team as a whole.
An accomplishment that I'm proud of regarding this project is the fact that I was able to design a fully functional website with JavaScript animations, a personal first. My team was also awarded the prize for Best Architectural Design!
Thanks for viewing my portfolio- I hope you like what you see enough to work with me, or simply say hello :)
