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Summary
Hoos Problem is an online forum designed for students at the university of virginia to tackle issues on groudns. The main idea stems from the fact that “two heads are better than one” in both identifying and solving problems. The goal is to connect students who may face non-trivial problems, with students who are eagier to provide non-trivial solutions.
In the current state, the website allows for anyone to post anonymously without an account. Because this was made as a proof of concept, verification that the user is in fact a UVA student was not implemented. Posts content, as well as the time and date that the post was created are stored in a Firebase Database. Each post also has associated comments and discussion sections, which can be added by any user, and are displayed on the post page. Posts are also given unique user icons, which are random and seeded based on the post time, and not actually associated with any user.
Languages Used: Typescript, HTML, CSS
Technologies Used: React, Firebase
Takeaways
This project helped me further understand websites that allow for user generated content. It allowed me to understand how a platform like instagram or twitter might manage posts and comments on that post. I also gained insight into storing content in a database (firebase in particular) as well as loading and dynamically displaying that data on a website.
While there are not many security features that are implemented currently in this project (as it was mainly created as a demo) it still lead me to
consider the various security implications. Further steps could include an automated content moderation system (potentially with a tool like GPT), as
well as a user account system that requires users to register with a virginia.edu email in order to post content on the site