🎨 WDC #13 Create an app to showcase a place or culture you care about

Bánh Mì Near Me

Web App demo (limited functionality – Yelp API and YouTube playback via Web Viewer do not work in a browser):
https://thunkable.site/w/VukDhec94

Video demo:

I think this is a great WDC theme but I was a little overwhelmed thinking about how to make something for it. It feels like something that would take me a while to create.

But what popped into my mind was… food! I’ve been on kind of a mission to find the best Bánh Mì sandwich in the SF Bay Area. Bánh Mì are Vietnamese sandwiches. I’ve so far sampled about a dozen restaurants’ faire.

And I realize that what I’ve created here is just a limited version of Yelp but… once in a while it’s good to be able to narrow the focus and just create an app for me. :slight_smile:

And the beauty of this approach, which is API based, is that by changing one text string from “Bánh Mì” to anything else (“steak”, “dessert”, “vegan, etc.”), I could instantly have an app that focuses on another type of cuisine. Here’s the exact same app but with “hot fudge sundae” replacing “Bánh Mì”:

Cultural caveats:
I realize that food in of itself does not represent a culture holistically and also that this particular food is born from colonialization. So focusing on it is potentially problematic. The video I included in the app does go into that history briefly.

Components used:
Web API (Yelp Fusion API)
Web Viewer
Location Sensor
Data Viewer Grid

External Sites used:
https://getemoji.com for text-based button icons
Best JSON Viewer and JSON Beautifier Online for re-formatting API results
How To Make Banh Mi with Andrea Nguyen - YouTube
https://www.color-hex.com/color-palettes for color palettes with hex values

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