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AKASH G
AKASH G

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Building the DSA Tracker I Wish I Had as a Student

DEV Weekend Challenge: Passion Edition Submission

Building the DSA Tracker I Wish I Had as a Student 🚀 #weekendchallenge

This is a submission for Weekend Challenge: Passion Edition

What I Built

I built DSA Tracker, a platform designed to help students stay consistent with Data Structures and Algorithms practice while learning concepts in an organized way.

Like many students preparing for placements and improving problem-solving skills, I often found myself asking:

  • Which problems have I solved?
  • Which topics am I weak at?
  • How do I track consistency over months instead of days?
  • Why do most trackers feel like spreadsheets rather than learning platforms?

DSA Tracker was my attempt to solve these problems.

The project started as a simple CRUD-based tracker but gradually evolved into a learning platform that combines:

  • Problem tracking
  • Progress monitoring
  • Topic-based organization
  • Interactive learning modules
  • A foundation for future analytics and personalized recommendations

The goal is simple:

Help students focus less on managing their preparation and more on improving their problem-solving skills.

As someone who is currently on the same journey, this project is deeply personal to me and perfectly matches the theme of Passion Edition.


Demo

Live Application

https://dsatracker-51wk.vercel.app/

GitHub Repository

https://github.com/ImGakash/dsatracker


Code

The entire source code is available on GitHub:

https://github.com/ImGakash/dsatracker


How I Built It

Frontend

  • React.js
  • HTML
  • CSS
  • JavaScript

Backend

  • Node.js
  • Express.js

Database

  • MongoDB

Additional Technologies

  • Google OAuth authentication
  • Razorpay integration
  • REST APIs

The project evolved through multiple iterations.

The earliest version was a simple tracker that allowed users to:

  • Add problems
  • Mark problems as solved
  • Delete entries
  • Track progress percentages

Over time, it expanded into a more ambitious platform with authentication, user management, learning modules, and deployment infrastructure.

Some interesting engineering challenges included:

  • Designing scalable data models for user progress.
  • Implementing authentication workflows.
  • Handling API communication between frontend and backend services.
  • Deploying and maintaining the application for real users.

One lesson this project taught me is that products rarely start as their final vision.

A small project can grow significantly when you continue improving it based on your own frustrations and experiences.


Prize Categories

I am submitting this as a general Weekend Challenge submission and not targeting any specific sponsor category.


Final Thoughts

This project exists because of a problem I personally faced.

The best projects often begin that way:

You build something because you need it yourself.

DSA Tracker is still evolving, and I hope to continue improving it into a platform that can genuinely help students stay consistent and motivated throughout their preparation journey.

Feedback and suggestions are always welcome!

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