Where is a robust, real-time coordination and communication platform designed for friends, teams, and groups. It eliminates the friction of meetups by providing real-time location sharing, integrated chatting, and automated ETA calculation.
The platform is designed for scale and consists of three primary subsystems:
- Android Client: A modern, Jetpack Compose-based mobile application.
- Cloud Functions: Serverless functions handling the social graph and friendship mutations.
- Relay Server: A high-performance Express + Socket.IO server handling real-time chat and high-frequency location updates.
- Granular Sharing: Share location for 15 minutes, 1 hour, custom durations, or continuously.
- Dynamic Map View: Real-time map rendering of all active group members.
- Automated ETA: Distance and speed-based arrival estimates to shared destinations.
- Battery Optimization: Adaptive intervals that adjust based on user movement state and battery level.
- Group & Direct Chats: Full-featured messaging capabilities natively integrated.
- Rich Media: Support for text, images, and voice messages.
- Socket.IO Integration: Low-latency delivery, real-time typing indicators, and read receipts.
- Offline Support: Local caching of messages via Room DB with background synchronization.
- Role-Based Access: Granular group permissions (Admin/Member).
- Friendship Mutations: Robust friend request, accept, decline, block, and unfriend flows powered by secure Cloud Functions.
- Profile Fan-Out: Automatic synchronization of profile updates across the denormalized social graph.
- Language: Kotlin
- UI Toolkit: Jetpack Compose (Pure Compose architecture)
- Architecture: MVVM (Model-View-ViewModel) + Clean Architecture principles
- Dependency Injection: Dagger Hilt
- Local Storage: Room Database (caching chats and locations)
- Maps & Location: Google Maps SDK, Fused Location Provider API
- Networking/Async: Kotlin Coroutines, Flow, Retrofit, Socket.IO Client
- Language: TypeScript / Node.js
- Purpose: Manages the social graph (Friendships, Blocks). Ensures transactional consistency across denormalized documents.
- Key Mechanics: Rate limiting, strict server-side validation, and background Firestore triggers (e.g., profile data fan-out).
- Language: Node.js (Express)
- Purpose: Chat message relay and high-frequency location brokering.
- Tech: Socket.IO for WebSocket connections, LRU caching for Auth tokens.
- Production Hardening:
- Helmet security headers & CORS allowlisting
- gzip compression
- Rate limiting & IP trusting (Cloud Run compatibility)
- Graceful SIGTERM shutdowns to prevent dropped messages
- Android Studio Ladybug (or newer) & JDK 17+
- Node.js v20+ (for backend services)
- Firebase CLI (
npm install -g firebase-tools) - Required API Keys: Google Maps API Key, Firebase
google-services.json
- Place the
google-services.jsonfile in theapp/directory. - Create
local.propertiesin the project root:MAPS_API_KEY=your_google_maps_api_key_here - Sync Gradle and run on a device or emulator with Google Play Services.
- Navigate to the functions directory:
cd functions - Install dependencies:
npm install - Test locally using the emulator:
npm run test:emulator - Deploy:
firebase deploy --only functions
- Navigate to the server directory:
cd server - Install dependencies:
npm install - Configure environment variables in an
.envfile (e.g., Firebase Admin credentials, CORS origins). - Run locally:
npm start - Deployment: Designed for deployment on Google Cloud Run, utilizing the built-in HTTP keep-alive and load balancing configurations.
- Authentication: Managed securely via Firebase Authentication. All server connections authenticate via cached bearer ID tokens.
- Data Access: Firestore rules enforce that users only read authorized social and group data. All write mutations to the social graph route through strict Cloud Functions.
- Location Privacy: Location data is ephemeral and sharing is strictly governed by user-defined timers and group boundaries.
Developed by Ismam Hasan Ovi. All rights reserved.