RhythmRun: When Team Projects Teach More Than Code

Vision

Problem: Whether you’re a first-time runner or elite marathon athlete, pacing runs remains one of the most difficult aspects of endurance running.

Our Solution: RhythmRun - a Flutter app that syncs your running pace with song BPMs using Spotify’s API, making consistent pacing intuitive and engaging.

Personal Motivation: I love music and wanted to help solve my friends’ problems with running. Why settle for random playlists when technology could actively help maintain a runner’s right pace?

Technical Architecture

Core Features

Spotify integration for music playback and BPM analysis
Cross-platform mobile app targeting iOS and Android

Aspirant Features

Real-time GPS tracking for pace monitoring
Pace synchronization algorithm matching running cadence to song tempo

My Technical Responsibilities

iOS development and configuation for Xcode specific configurations (e.g. entitlements)
Backend architecture for user authentication and data persistence
Spotify API integration for music control and analysis

Tech Stack

Frontend: Flutter/Dart
Music Integration: Spotify SDK + Web API
Backend: User authentication and data storage through Supabase
Platform Focus: iOS (with Android support)
Development Environment: JDK v17, NDK ≥ v27

Technical Wins

Spotify Integration Success

The Spotify integration was actually easier than expected! The existing Dart packages were relatively well-documented and worked reliably:

// Connecting the Spotify's SDK
  Future<void> connectToSpotifySDK() async {
    try {
      loading = true;
      var result = await SpotifySdk.connectToSpotifyRemote(
        clientId: clientID,
        redirectUrl: redirectURI,
      );
      loading = false;
    } on PlatformException catch (e) {
      loading = false;
    } on MissingPluginException {
      loading = false;
    }
  }

Plus, the example that the package provides works nicely: Lady Gaga's Disease song playing on SpotifySDK Example app

Following the official API documentation was mostly smooth, except for Android.

iOS Development Discovery

After getting an Apple Developer Account, I was amazed by the quality and quantity of Apple’s development resources. The documentation is comprehensive, and the customization possibilities are incredible.

Key iOS insights:

Apple’s developer ecosystem is genuinely impressive and intimidating once you’re inside it
Apple’s Entitlement system and other integrations were really good and interesting.
Platform-specific configurations make a real difference in user experience

After combing through Apple’s developer resources, it made me inspired to start coding in Swift!

Cross-Platform Challenges

Learning how Flutter bridges native iOS/Android code with a unified codebase was fascinating. The framework handles most platform differences, but understanding the underlying native implementations was crucial for optimization. Especially towards the beginning, with a lot of panicked commits on making sure it works successfully on Android without breaking it on the iOS side as well!

Reality of a Student Development Team

Stats

5 person team
3 actively contributing members
2 teammates who had a ton of external responsibilities to meaningfully participate

Leadership Under Pressure

One of our teammates struggled with severe anxiety, which required me to completely adapt my communication and project management style.

What I Learned About Leadership:

Compassionate communication - Different people need different types of support and feedback
Flexible expectations - Mental health challenges are real and need thoughtful accommodation
Project adaptation - Sometimes you need to redistribute work to keep everyone contributing meaningfully

This not only taught me about technical skills in software development, but how team dynamics and emotional intelligence matter just as much as code quality.

Planning Trap

Timeline Reality

We spent about 63% of the semester planning the “perfect” app, then rushed development in the final months:

RhythmRun design diagram showing app architecture

What Happened:

Extensive user research and feature specification
UI/UX mockups and user flow diagrams
Architecture planning and technology evaluation
Planning tests before coding based on all of the above
But limited time for actual implementation…

The lesson: Perfect planning doesn’t necessarily guarantee smooth execution. Real software development always surfaces during unexpected challenges that you can’t fully plan for.

Better Approach:

Start using the first part of the semester in educating the team on core technologies and workflows
Guide the team to finish the Minimal Viable Product (MVP) first, iterate second
Start coding sooner to discover unknown unknowns (like Music API integration with Apple Music)
Plan in sprints, and don’t overload sprints with too much work

What’s Next?

Rebuild Plan

I’m planning to rebuild this solo (or with a friend) with key improvements:

Swift Integration for Apple Music: Flutter packages for Apple Music weren’t reliable since I could never change the PlayerState or PlayerQueue, as shown below: Now I have enough iOS experience to implement native Swift integration properly.

Better Architecture: Apply lessons learned about:

Modular code organization
API reliability testing
User authentication flow optimization

Refined Scope: Focus on core functionality first, add advanced features incrementally.

Real-World Skills Gained

Technical Competencies

Mobile development lifecycle from concept to deployment
API integration and reliability patterns
Cross-platform architecture considerations
iOS-specific development insights

Professional Skills

Team leadership under pressure
Compassionate project management
Timeline and scope management
Stakeholder communication (team members, instructors, and runners)

Process Lessons

MVP-first development approach
Agile planning vs. waterfall planning
Risk assessment and mitigation
Technical debt management

Bigger Picture

This project taught me how software development is fundamentally collaborative. Even when the code works perfectly, projects can struggle due to team dynamics, communication challenges, or planning issues.

The technical skills I gained were valuable, but the people skills I developed are arguably more important for real-world software development.

RhythmRun represents my transition from solo coding projects to collaborative software development. Along with all the challenges and growth opportunities that come with working on a team! 👨🏻‍💻