CARPOOLIO

Planning a trip with multiple cars and passengers can quickly become overwhelming, especially when coordination happens through fragmented group chats, spreadsheets, or last-minute messages. Instead of relying on scattered messaging, Carpoolio solved this problem by centralizing ride coordination, making group trips smoother and more efficient.

Unlike traditional carpooling apps focused on daily commutes or ride-sharing with strangers, Carpoolio was tailored for pre-existing groups — people who already know each other but need a better way to organize their rides. Whether it was a road trip, a festival, or an out-of-town event, the app provided a dedicated space to plan rides, assign seats, and ensure everyone knew who they were traveling with, when they were leaving, and how they were getting there.

Since it was my first web application, naturally I ran into lots of problems. Early on, I had trouble creating reusable components. It was easy to create a one-off component, but making it flexible and reusable across the app required thinking about props, state management, and keeping things modular.

I didn't realize how important it was to test the application across different browsers (and later devices). Certain styles and features worked fine on one browser but caused issues on others, requiring me to tweak the CSS and use fallback techniques. I started with vanilla CSS for custom styling, however I ended up installing Tailwind CSS after learning it from another project because I found it less complicated than managing separate classes and CSS files. While this made styling easier, I still considered rewriting some parts for better organization.

These challenges were part of the learning process, but with each one, I gained a deeper understanding of the web development workflow and how to build more efficient and scalable applications.