Houston We Have a Virus - Space Apps Challenge

Houston We Have a Virus| The Isolation Solution

The Isolation Solution

Social distancing policies enacted the world over during the COVID-19 pandemic have left many people socially isolated. Your challenge is to develop innovative solutions to combat social isolation.

Crew Journal: A Space Flight Planner for Isolated Terrestrials

Summary

The COVID-19 Pandemic has changed the dramatically changed the lives of people. In order to better keep communities healthy and ensure adequate care of vulnerable individuals, experts are advising self-isolation. Self-isolation is a novel concept to most people, however astronauts have been facing issues involving isolation for decades. Our project aims to relate the struggles the average person now faces on Earth with the research and experience of decades of space travel research via an app.

How We Addressed This Challenge

Our project is a user-friendly task tracking app that allows individuals to understand and monitor their habits during this isolation period. The app relates the schedules and routines of the user to the optimal/recorded schedules of astronauts during long space missions or aboard the International Space Station. By giving fact-based corollaries from focused and productive individuals in a similarly isolated environment, we hope to provide evidence of an achievable and balanced lifestyle even during this pandemic.

The app also features as a database of interesting quotes and facts about astronauts to remind them that they are not the only ones to have gone through isolation. There will be a page of sources for all the facts and quotes, alongside a section in which users can visit a set of curated videos created by governmental space agencies around the world, or featuring astronauts. These videos are chosen with a goal of providing perspectives on isolation from the professionals who know it best, as well as providing information on how astronauts complete necessary activities in a space habitat.

In the future, the app will also have reminders for users to help them achieve their set goals. Also, since social-isolation often causes people to experience loneliness which can be extremely detrimental to both physical and mental health, the app will have a specific focus on reminding users about socializing. This will include contacting members of a personally-designated group of close friends on a regular basis, and planning future events.

How We Developed This Project

After going through all of our challenge options, we felt we could have the most impact by making an app anyone could use to help improve their quality of life during this pandemic. We split up the work among us 4 members, between back-end, front-end, graphic design, and research. We used Javascript (with TypeScript), HTML, CSS, Node JS, and Express. Graphic design was done using available open-source software, such as Inkscape and GIMP.

One of the early problems our teams had was focusing on which aspects of the app were important to create and implement for this project, and which aspects were interesting but unfeasible for the limited time available. Once a clear direction was decided upon, the team was able to move forward into production and research. There were frequent hiccups and design aspects that needed a consensus, however by keeping near-constant direct lines of communication between the whole team, we were able to work quickly to resolve issues that did arrive and maintain steady progress through the duration of the project. By frequently sharing art assets, and research progress, developers were aided in creating a solid image of the eventual end product and delegate their efforts accordingly. The collaboration also helped keep morale up and breaks were freely taken when needed, as individuals were fully trusted to accomplish their tasks in a timely manner.