Students’ apps to keep out tropical rain
Nomad Hackathon is a monthly event where all our young coding students meet and build projects that serve the community around them. Being notorious for its tropical weather, it’s rather tricky to stay dry in Hong Kong in the rain season. What’s the hack from Preface coding students to keep the moist away?
App Inventor team who created the best umbrella rental app in May Hackathon.
Umbrella rentals on demand
What’s the one essential to have when you need to be on the move under the rain? A trusty umbrella, of course. The trouble of carrying one around though is a big put off. At the same time, our App Inventor students saw it as an unnecessary problem in nowaday’s sharing economy — we share everything from videos to bicycles and even homes. Why not umbrellas, too? It should be there when you need it, and gone when you don’t.
There born the idea of Preface Coffee’s “Umbrella-To-Go” app. The cafe is launching an umbrella rental service this summer — for $50 anyone can rent an umbrella from Preface Coffee. Upon returning, guests can redeem a drink for free. Our baristas will be using this app to keep track of the rental record and send reminders to guests who are yet to return the umbrellas.
We will first soft launch this service at Preface Coffee, and slowly add more collection points around the district of Tin Hau, Hong Kong. Expect to see a troop of Tin-Hau dwellers crossing the zebra lines holding up black umbrellas (or the blue cups from Preface Coffee) later this summer!
T-Rex Runner Game in Preface Coffee
For the younger students from the Scratch class, they created a mini game for people to play while waiting for the sulky rain to stop. It’s a mini game called Baby T-Rex Runner. You may have encountered this game from Preface Coffee already, but this one is new, you know, with a cute baby T-Rex. The winning version from Alvin features a gigantic, earth-piercing rainbow in the background. It’s his ultimate tribute to anyone who’s patient enough to wait for the rain to stop, for the rainbow to show its true glory.
With these creations from our students we are all set for the summer rain to hit. Now we’re just waiting for the rain to come. Time to play a round of Baby T-Rex Runner, maybe…?
