Cross-Platform Goal Tracker

Full-stack goal-tracking platform designed around scoped user workflows and an iterative MVP.

Overview

The Cross-Platform Goal Tracker is a full-stack application designed to help users create goals, track progress, and manage goal-related activities through structured workflows.

Developed as a graduate Computer Science group project at the University of Arizona, the project provided hands-on experience taking a software product from requirements and feature definition through implementation, integration, and testing.

Problem

Goal-tracking applications need to make it easy for users to translate broad goals into actions they can manage and revisit over time.

For the project, we approached this as both a software engineering and product-design problem:

  • What functionality belongs in the initial product?
  • What are the primary user workflows?
  • How should features interact across the application?
  • Which capabilities are essential for an MVP?
  • How should frontend, backend, API, and database components work together?

Product Approach

We translated the application requirements into scoped features and user workflows and prioritized functionality for an initial MVP.

The development process included:

  • Defining application requirements
  • Breaking requirements into implementable features
  • Mapping end-to-end user workflows
  • Prioritizing MVP functionality
  • Iteratively implementing and testing features
  • Refining functionality based on integration and testing results

This helped keep development centered on complete user workflows rather than isolated technical components.

Technical Implementation

The application integrated:

  • Frontend interface
  • Backend application logic
  • REST APIs
  • Persistent database storage

We connected and validated these components across end-to-end workflows and troubleshot issues that emerged at component boundaries.

Iterative Development

Rather than treating implementation as a single delivery step, we iteratively tested functionality as the application evolved.

This included:

  • Validating feature behavior against requirements
  • Testing frontend-backend interactions
  • Troubleshooting API and data-flow issues
  • Identifying integration problems
  • Refining functionality across development cycles

Product Takeaways

The project provided practical experience connecting product requirements with technical implementation.

It reinforced several core product-development principles:

  • Define the user workflow before optimizing individual features
  • Scope an achievable MVP
  • Treat technical dependencies as part of prioritization
  • Validate functionality across the complete user journey
  • Use testing and iteration to refine product behavior

The project strengthened my experience working at the intersection of product thinking, software engineering, and cross-functional development.