Microsprint 4 - Week 23/08/2026 - 29/08/2026

Description of the problem and the solution

Problem: During this first sprint, we identified that a big problem for university students is that they frequently waste time determining how to use their free periods—specifically deciding who to socialize with and where to eat on campus. Ultimately, the core challenge lies in effectively managing these schedule gaps to maximize their time.

Solution: Our proposed solution enables users to view the schedule availability of select friends or colleagues, making it easy to coordinate shared free time. It also features a curated activity catalog tailored to the group's preferences, alongside a discovery tool for nearby restaurants that offers perks such as takeout ordering and exclusive discount vouchers.

Analitycs persona

Description: Daniel Duplat is a 20–25-year-old single Data Analyst and Engineering student at Universidad de los Andes. High tech-savvy and quick to adapt to new applications, he relies primarily on his Android 16 smartphone and work laptop to perform his daily work. In his role, Daniel wants to analyze what students do in their free time and understand their usage patterns across different time gaps. He seeks to identify student location and activity preferences to develop features tailored to their actual routines and available time, making personalized offerings possible. However, he faces significant obstacles: student data is disorganized and outdated, making manual collection slow, hard to scale, and ineffective for tracking behavior changes. Furthermore, comparing activities across varying schedule gaps makes identifying common free-time patterns particularly difficult.

Context Canva

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PA's

PAS 1 — Knowing what to do during a gap

Problem: Students have gaps between classes and sometimes do not know how to use that time in a useful or enjoyable way.

Alternative: They normally improvise by studying, sitting somewhere, eating, or messaging friends to see if anyone is free.

Solution: An app that detects the length of the gap and recommends activities that can realistically be completed before the next class.

PAS 2 - Coordinating with friends

Problem: Students want to spend their free periods with friends, but their schedules often do not match.

Alternative: They message friends individually or ask in group chats until they find someone available.

Solution: A shared availability system that automatically shows which friends have overlapping free time.

PAS 3 - Finding food that fits the available time.

Problem: Students may want to eat during a gap but do not know which option fits their remaining time, location, and budget.

Alternative: They go to familiar restaurants or walk around until they find something sutiable.

Solution: Recommend food options based on the student's available time, distance, price, and preferences.

PAS 4 - Discovering new food options

Problem: Students do not know all the restaurants and affordable food options available around campus.

Alternative: They discover new places through friends, by walking past them, or simply by chance.

Solution: A centralized food catalog with nearby restaurants, prices, location, food type and student information/reviews.

PAS 5 - Arriving at a full restaurant.

Problem: Students can spend part of a short gap walking to a restaurant only to find that there are no tables or the waiting time is too long.

Alternative: They search for another restaurant or return to a familiar cafeteria after already losing time.

Solution: Show estimated occupancy, waiting time, or current availability before the student decides where to go.

PAS 6 - Finding campus activities

Problem: Students may want to exercise, play sports, or participate in another campus activity during their gaps but do not know what is available at that moment.

Alternative: They use what they already know, check different university platforms, or simply the activity.

Solution: A centralized activity catalog showing available activities, facilities, schedules, and reservation links.

PAS 7 - Academic work unexpectedly consumes the gap.

Problem: Students cannot always plan their free time because assignments and academic responsibilities can suddenly become more important.

Alternative: They cancel their original plan and use the entire gap for academic work.

Solution: Provide flexible recommendations that can quickly adapt to a shorter or changed free-time window.

PAS 8 - Organizing a spontaneous plan

Problem: Even when students know what they want to do and who is free, coordinating the plan takes time.

Alternative: They create several WhatsApp messages to decide the activity, place, time, and participants.

Solution: Let a user create a plan inside the app and send one invitation containing the activity, location and time.

PAS 9 - Having nobody familiar available.

Problem: A student may have a long gap and want to socialize or do an activity, but none of their usual friends are free.

Alternative: They spend the gap alone, study, or abandon the activity, they wanted to do.

Solution: Suggest other university students with compatible schedules and shared interests who are interested in the same activity.

PAS 10 - Information is fragmented

Problem: Students need to check several places to find schedules, activities, food, events, reservations, and friends' availability.

Alternative: They switch between university platforms, calendars, maps, social media, WhatsApp, and websites until they find what they need.

Solution: A single app that combines that student's available time with relevant activities, food options, events, and social plans.

Business questions

Type 1 questions

• Is the average loading time of the app less than 1 second?
• Which screen or app component has the highest crash rate?

Type 2 questions

• How much time do students spend from opening the app to selecting an activity for their free period?
• What is the proportion of recommended activities that are selected by the students during their available free time windows?
• How often do recommended activities match the duration of the students available free time?
• Which of the recomended categories is most frequently selected during the different free time durations?

Type 3 questions

• Which feature is used by less than 40% of the active users?
• What percentage of active users use the Friend Availability feature to create or join a plan?
• How does the use of the Friend Availability feature affect the number of plans created with other students?
• How does removing the Friend Availability feature affect the number of social plans created by users?

Type 4 questions

• Which restaurants and activity providers receive the highest number of recommendation views and selections during students' free periods?
• Which types of activities or restaurants are most frequently searched for by students during specific time periods?

Type 5 questions

• How does network quality affect the loading time of recommendations and the rate at which students select an activity?
• Which combination of student preferences, free-time duration, location, and friend availability produces the highest rate of successful plan creation?

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