IChooSe

The Problem

University departments needed a way to manage shared room reservations without the back-and-forth emails and spreadsheet conflicts that plagued the existing manual process.

The Solution

I built IChooSe as a MERN stack reservation platform with real-time availability and OTP-based authentication.

• OTP authentication — Email-based one-time passwords for secure, passwordless login.
• Room scheduling — Calendar-based interface for browsing availability and creating reservations with conflict detection.
• RESTful API — Clean endpoint design for rooms, reservations, and user management.
• Caching and file storage integration for performance and document attachments.

What Went Wrong

The initial conflict detection checked for overlapping time slots only after form submission, leading to a poor UX where users would fill out a form only to be told the room was taken.

The fix: I added real-time availability checking on the calendar UI — as users select a time slot, the interface immediately shows whether it's available, preventing wasted form submissions.

Results

• OTP-based passwordless auth for secure access
• Real-time conflict detection before form submission
• Clean REST API with caching for responsive UI