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Building Unisala: A Tale of Experiments and Purpose | Series 1
Dec 7, 2024
174 views
Written by Prashant Basnet
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👋 Welcome — You’ve Landed on My Signature Page
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<p class="text-base sm:text-lg mb-4">
Hey, I’m <strong class="text-black dark:text-white">Prashant Basnet</strong> — software developmemt engineer at
<a href="https://unisala.com" class="text-indigo-600 dark:text-indigo-400 underline hover:no-underline" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">
Unisala.com
</a>.
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<p class="text-base sm:text-lg mb-6">
You’re viewing my <strong>Signature</strong>, a digital space where I share what I’m learning, building, and reflecting on, all in one place.
</p>
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📍 Found this page via LinkedIn, my personal site, or a shared link?
<br />
This isn’t a traditional portfolio. It’s my public digital notebook where I document useful ideas, experiments, and lessons I’ve learned as I build.
</div>
<h2 class="text-lg font-semibold mb-2">What You’ll Find Here:</h2>
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<li>✍️ Thoughts on algorithms, systems, and software design</li>
<li>🧠 Insights from building at Unisala</li>
<li>🔗 Direct links to everything I’ve published on Unisala</li>
</ul>
</section>
The Evolution of Unisala: A 4 year journey:
The first chapter of the Unisala story began 4 years ago (2020-2021). I was in my senior year of undergraduate, the first version was launched in the android playstore.
The idea was very basic & simple:
The project was launched as a Proof of concept and experimentation of an idea. From the launch to till date. Who could have predicted that this journey would involve so many experiments?
Every aspect has been iterated, refined & reimagined. What started as the work of an amateur student has transformed into the creation of a well-revised architect.
This is first thread in a series focused on transferring the knowledge, i've gained as the developer of Unisala.com. Having grown from an amateur developer to architecting unisala.com
Through this series, i will dive into the thought process behind key decisions, the problems faced & the lessons i've learned along the way.
My goal is to create a resource that serves as:
Initial Day Features:
Initially as mentioned in the bio of the app, it was designed for international students who wanted to study higher education in USA universities. In the first version the platform had features like:
From Features to Fundamentals:
In the early days, i was very much an amateur, with limited tools & exposure under my belt. Each iteration taught us valuable lessons, about what worked, what didn't and what a startup team truly needs to thrive. While i had a clear vision of what i wanted to build, i lacked the experience to draw critical lines or prioritise aspects beyond the core functionality.
It wasn’t until I realised that elements weren’t just about usability, they were fundamental to the overall platform’s growth, reach, and success.
We focused on pushing out functionality features at rapid pace. We were driven by the desire to solve every problem students faced. In doing so, we experimented with
In the early days of the team, we didn't even have a project board, every user story & features discussed in the meeting lived in our heads. I know it was already 2020, but the lack of experience & accountability in the team made our approach far too careless.
A profound question reshaped our entire approach:
This question didn't come from an end user but from a moment of introspection.
I realised like many others, i'm hesitant to download an unknown app, but i'm far more willing to click on a link & experience something before committing.
This shifted our perspective entirely and led us to rethink our fundamentals.
At the time, my technical knowledge was largely confined to javascript and few libraries, which influenced my decision to choose Ionic React, It seemed like the brilliant one stop solution that promised rapid development & cross platform compatibility.
React Native -> Ionic React.
Thus the transition of our app from React Native into Ionic React
The Challenges of Unisala’s Ionic Phase
A detail optimization thread
We started rebuilding the app from Scratch, this time focusing on creating a platform rather than just an app. Unisala second version was built using Ionic React, chosen for its promise of cross-platform development, a single codebase for web, Android, and iOS. Initially, this sounded perfect for a startup, especially since we had experience building apps with Ionic.
We experimented with new features almost every week. Following features were developed:
University Related features:
User related features:
Messaging: Direct communication for collaboration and discussions.
As team of five developers we iterated on the product and features numerous time more over 1000 commits in total.
Each iteration refined the platform. These experiments not only shaped the product but also helped define our core vision.
At once, our core vision was:
We focused entirely on building something that's helpful for students.
In this next thread, we will discuss about the analytics and how costly it proved for us neglecting it.