Coming Up With The Purrfect Idea

The idea for PolyPal was sparked by a simple question: How can we make practicing conversations in a new language fun, flexible, and pawsitively engaging?

Hey everyone! We’re thrilled to introduce our creation: PolyPal! This isn’t just another language tool: it’s a personal AI conversation buddy. Whether you’re studying new vocabulary, honing your grammar, or just building the courage to speak up, PolyPal’s here to practice with you!

We’ve all been there, with language practice that feels awkward or tedious. So, we set out to change that! With PolyPal, you can chat with an AI buddy that adjusts to your level, helps with corrections (without making it awkward), and even adds a bit of humor to keep things lighthearted. Whether you’re preparing for a trip, acing a class, or just sharpening your skills, PolyPal is the way to turn practice into play!

Feline-Approved Features

Below are some of our key features:

Language support: Support for 7 different languages from Spanish to Chinese.
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Interactive Learning: Practice real conversations with an AI that adapts to your language level and Enjoy witty, pesky humor that makes every chat a delight.
Note-Taking: Registered users are able to take detailed notes on each topic.
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Cosmetics for Motivation: To make learning exciting, we introduced a shop feature where learners can "purchase" fun, in-app cosmetics using points earned through conversations. Users can buy cute items to decorate your cat profile with points earned through hard work of language learning.

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Pawsome Tech Stack

Amazon Bedrock & Security

During the development process, we focused on creating an intuitive and functional chat screen for a AI powered chatbot with Amazon Bedrock. This involved designing real-time messaging capabilities with smooth interactions, ensuring that messages were sent, received, and displayed seamlessly. We implemented features like dynamic message rendering and thoughtful UI elements to make the chat experience engaging and user-friendly.

On the backend, we set up a secure authentication system to manage user login and sessions, ensuring data privacy and a reliable connection throughout the interaction. Finally, we worked on the frontend, crafting a visually appealing and responsive interface that tied everything together. The combination of these efforts resulted in a polished, cohesive system that prioritizes both usability and security.

Amazon DynamoDB & S3

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Building a complex inventory system required several key components and careful planning beforehand. First, a table was used to track user progress, storing important information like the number of points earned, the clothes currently equipped on their avatar, and other relevant data. Another table was dedicated to recording the clothes purchased from the store, while a third table kept track of the store’s available inventory. Each clothing item in the store was linked to an image stored in our S3 bucket for easy access and display.

Overall, integrating DynamoDB into our application involved creating queries to ensure data updates were handled correctly. Additionally, we had to continuously update our tables to accommodate the features we rolled out. In the end, DynamoDB provided a powerful and scalable solution for managing user data and was an essential tool for our project’s success.

Amazon Polly

When developing a language learning application, we recognized the importance of incorporating text-to-speech functionality to enhance the user experience. After exploring various options, we chose Amazon Polly for its seamless integration and features.

Amazon Polly was easy to integrate, as we were already leveraging other AWS services within our platform. There was support for multiple languages and the pronunciation from each of its voices stood out. This ensured that users could immerse themselves in learning and get familiar with the natural flow of the language.

To implement this, we used AWS SDKs to create a backend API that handled text-to-speech requests. Whenever a user wanted to hear a word or an entire message, the application sent a request to this API. Depending on the user’s selected language, the application provided various character voices to make the experience more engaging and personalized. These voices were chosen from what Amazon Polly provided to match the language being learned, which further enhanced our language learning website.

Amazon Q

Amazon Q Developer has been extremely helpful for our team when coding up features and learning how to use certain AWS features. During development, we often encountered challenges which included debugging complex issues. With Amazon Q, it felt like having an additional programmer on the team offering a pair-programming experience for each of us. Its ability to understand our current files and workspace was especially valuable when working larger features with each member on our team working on parts of the larger feature.

Amazon Q was also very helpful in explaining the code to each member of the team. For example, frontend styling could sometimes be verbose and became easier with Amazon Q. Each team member could easily understand how to make minor changes and it allowed everyone to add a personal touch to the website.

Purrplexing Challenges We Faced

Building PolyPal presented its own set of challenges. Here are some challenges we faced during development:

Making Conversations Feel Natural: It wasn’t enough for the AI to respond; it needed to feel like chatting with a real buddy. We spent hours refining prompts, balancing creativity and structure, and making sure PolyPal felt truly engaging.
Designing a Delightful UI: We wanted PolyPal to feel as inviting as a cozy cat cafe. Creating a clean, engaging, and intuitive user interface meant hours of design iterations. From playful animations to smooth navigation, every detail was crafted to keep users engaged and coming back for more!
Avatar Customization: We focused on optimizing the database for shop items to ensure a seamless user experience while providing a varied selection of cosmetics.

With these efforts, we’ve made sure that every aspect of PolyPal, from the conversations to the rewards, keeps you motivated to practice and grow!

Plans for the Fur-ture

We’ve got big dreams for PolyPal’s future, and we’re just getting started! Here’s what we’re planning to bring out next:

Group Chats: Imagine practicing conversations with friends or other PolyPal users in real-time scenarios. Teamwork makes the dream work!
Cultural Insights: Fun trivia, mini-games, and cultural facts about the language and culture you’re learning will keep you entertained and engaged!
Personalized Progress: PolyPal is getting even smarter, offering tailored conversation topics, vocabulary, and challenges to fit your goals.

We’re so excited to keep building PolyPal into the ultimate language practice companion! Whether you’re practicing for fun, travel, or fluency, PolyPal is here to make sure your journey is full of fun and success.

From the team,
Grace, Full-stack Developer
Huy, UI/UX Designer & Front-end Developer
Twig, UI/UX Designer
Jack, Backend Developer
Muhammad, Full-stack Developer
Lorien, Backend Developer

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