NewsMapper

Inspiration

The inspiration comes from the fact that keeping up with current events is sometimes tedious and unintuitive when reading information from an article or watching a video. A way to make it more intuitive is to provide an interactive world map with world events dotted around. This concept is applicable to a wide audience, as both regular followers of current events and those who don't often keep up can find an engaging place to stay informed.

What It Does

NewsMapper serves as a way to view past and present events on an interactive map. The application features two sliders to adjust:

The number of news events displayed.
The time period these events occurred, up to the present date.

Additionally, we integrated Gemini AI to summarize weekly events. Other basic features include the ability to change map tiles and utilize scrolling/zooming for a better user experience.

How We Built It

We built a full-stack web application using:

Frontend: React.js
Backend: Spring Boot
Database: MongoDB

We utilized publicly available APIs for the map, news, and generative AI summaries. AI tools also assisted us in resolving technical challenges during development.

Challenges We Ran Into

Merge Conflicts: With four team members working on the same project, often in similar locations, merge conflicts in Git were frequent. Despite splitting components to work simultaneously, we encountered multiple conflicts and even lost code at times.
Unfamiliar Technologies: We had to work with several new tools and APIs, which required learning and adapting on the fly. AI tools were instrumental in explaining concepts and assisting with implementation.
Parsing News Data: The news API provided data in a .txt file containing links to .zip files. These needed to be unzipped into .csv files, then parsed and converted into a .json format for use in the application.

Accomplishments We're Proud Of

For many of us, this was our first or second hackathon. We’re incredibly proud of building a working application that includes the features we initially planned. By setting deadlines and keeping all team members updated throughout the process, we first created a simpler version of our project and then expanded it with additional features.

What We Learned

New Tools and APIs: We gained experience with APIs for interactive maps, data handling in MongoDB, and integrating Generative AI tools.
Web Application Design: We learned to design interactive features such as sliders, markers, popups, and sidebars.
Team Collaboration: We developed better strategies for effective teamwork, ensuring each teammate could work efficiently and independently without causing merge conflicts.

What's Next for NewsMapper

In the future, we plan to:

Enhance AI Integration: Use AI to ensure the credibility of news displayed on the map.
Expand the Database: Include a diverse range of local, national, and international news sources.
Implement Filters: Add AI-powered filters based on geographic regions, topic interests, and credibility ratings.

These features will provide users with greater control, ensuring a more personalized and relevant news experience.