[{"content":"Idea \u0026ldquo;You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.\u0026rdquo; ~ James Clear, Atomic Habits\nAs a big fan of James Clear’s Atomic Habits, I strongly believe that long-term success is achieved through consistent effort rather than short bursts of motivation. Many friends and acquaintances I have spoken to feel the same way, yet they have found that simply tracking their habits is often not enough to stay committed over time.\nSo in IdenTEAM you build groups with people who try to build the same habit and proof your progress by sharing photos of it:\nTheoretical Background I based IdenTEAM on both social accoutability and periodic check-ins since research on accountability suggests that publicly committing to a goal and regularly reporting progress to others can substantially increase the likelihood of following through. The widely cited ASTD accountability study found that goal completion rates increased from 65% when committing to another person to up to 95% when regular accountability check-ins were involved.\n#TODO I am currently stitching together the prototyped features (such as APNs notifications, Camera and S3 storage for photos) before transitioning to design the app.\nOngoing TestFlight testing (join the beta!) allows me to collect real-world feedback and iteratively improve the app already in this stage.\n","permalink":"https://nicostern.de/posts/identeam/","summary":"A native iOS app that combines social accountability, photo-based check-ins, and cloud services to support habit formation.","title":"IdenTEAM"},{"content":"Me and my friends searched for a simple solution to recall certain key quotes from our favourite books since\u0026hellip;\n\u0026ldquo;Your mind is for having ideas, not for holding them.\u0026rdquo; ~ David Allen, Getting Things Done\nAfter some brainstorming and exchange with other readers regarding their feature ideas I developed Kuotes, an app that enables users to alter and view their highlights at a glance directly form their home screen through widgets.\nYou are welcomed to join the beta once I release it so stay tuned :).\n","permalink":"https://nicostern.de/posts/kuotes/","summary":"For me and my friends I developed a native iOS app to revisit book highlights from our kindles directly on our iPhone\u0026rsquo;s homescreens.","title":"Kuotes"},{"content":"From Idea to Product Starting from the abstract goal of making the core principles of Large Language Models (LLMs) accessible to middle school students, our four-person team at university developed an educational web game. While the project was constrained by the requirement that the game had to be integrated into an AI workshop organized by the Stiftung Wissen der Sparkasse KölnBonn, we first had to develop the game’s conceptual structure ourselves through several exploratory design phases before any implementation could begin. Essential for the success of the following implementation phase was the precise coordination between the frontend and backend team.\nIn the game (mintki.de) we demonstrate that LLMs can only provide reliable answers within the scope of their training data, while unfamiliar situations may lead to unexpected behavior such as hallucinations. It also illustrates how biases in training data can propagate into real-world outcomes and affect decision-making processes.\nFeedback and Adaptions Throughout development, the project was evaluated iteratively with multiple groups of students. Feedback from these sessions was continuously incorporated to refine the gameplay experience. Based on both user feedback and findings from current educational and gamification research, we introduced additional game mechanics (e.g. gamification elements) and adapted to the given environment (e.g. schools having old tablets only).\nExamples The introduction of virtual coins and a shop visibly boosted the student\u0026rsquo;s engagement in the levels:\nSince many schools appear not to provide a stable internet connection, we had to store the users\u0026rsquo; progress in the backend and provide the option to rejoin:\n","permalink":"https://nicostern.de/posts/mintbakerai/","summary":"As part of a university project, my team developed an educational web game aimed at teaching school students the fundamentals of AI and large language models.","title":"MINTbakerAI"},{"content":"A custom wedding website developed for a private client (can\u0026rsquo;t really say no to a cousin who needs a Wedsite, right?).\nDabstar-Wedding.de allows guests to view important information in multiple languages and saves their RSVP to the wedding. The responsive design is inspired by Apple\u0026rsquo;s new, rounded Liquid Glass design language.\nThe project evolved through multiple feedback cycles, resulting in multilingual support and a range of client-driven design refinements.\n","permalink":"https://nicostern.de/posts/dabstar-wedding/","summary":"I designed and refined the wedding website of a stakeholder iteratively using their feedback.","title":"Dabstar Wedding"},{"content":"After passing my A-levels, I missed working on projects and having coding targets. Therefore, I prepared for my Bachelor in Computer Science at University of Bonn by completing the HarvardX Course \u0026ldquo;CS50\u0026rsquo;s Introduction to Computer Science\u0026rdquo;. CS50 Quiz evolved as my self-chosen final project:\nUsing the knowledge gained throughout the ten weeks of CS50x, I explored Google Firebase as a cloud-based storage solution for content (questions about the CS50x course) delivered to the Swift app.\n","permalink":"https://nicostern.de/posts/cs50quiz/","summary":"As the final project of a computer science course before university, I prototyped a native iOS app backed by a cloud-based backend platform.","title":"CS50 Quiz"}]