Some favorite student projects using the Twitter API

As students start heading back to class from summer vacations, we want to highlight some recent cool projects that make use of the Twitter API. Our hope is that these projects will help inspire you to create your own creative projects with the Twitter API throughout the academic year ahead.

Mapping road closures caused by natural disasters

Arielle Miro, Aruna Rayapeddi, Deepa Mahidhara, and Julia Neumann were recently students at General Assembly’s data science intensive course. They used the Twitter API combined with HERE.com’s API to get traffic reports in order to create a map of emergency road closures for the Raleigh, North Carolina area. In fact,  Julia said that this project provided a great way for her to gain exposure and practice for upcoming hiring manager interviews. She even stated that, “talking about this project got me my job!”. You can check out a write up on the project and the code that powered this project.

A tree that Tweets at Harvard

At Harvard University, a Postdoctoral Fellow enabled a old-growth red oak tree to Tweet out the impact of climate change on its personified life. This tree is located in Harvard’s Witness Forrest and the project was inspired by a book called Witness Tree. The tree (and the team behind it) uses the Twitter API to post the Tweets. To generate the information that the tree Tweets about, sensors and cameras are attached around the tree to get biometric data which is combined with data from the Harvard Forest Data Archive. This tree will Tweet about how it’s changing on a daily basis and how climate change is impacting its growth. You can learn more about this project by checking out this article.

Using Twitter data to track trains

Right before April Daley started at the Grace Hopper Program at Fullstack Academy, she attended a #TapIntoTwitter event at the @TwitterNYC office. At this event, she heard a member of our Twitter Developer Relations team talk about how she solved her NYC parking problem with Python and Twitter.

April was inspired by this presentation and went on to create a train tracker that uses Twitter data to create notifications of train status from MTA without having to manually check Twitter. To create this solution, April used a combination of the programming technologies including Node.js, Express.js, React Native, Redux.js, Expo, Twilio API, and the Twitter API. You can check out April’s code on her GitHub.

Building a Twitter bot in 17 lines of code

Omar Sinan, a student from Carnegie Mellon University, wrote a tutorial on how to create a simple Twitter bot in Node.js. This guide walks you through how to easily create an app and is great for beginners or folks who are interested in switching to a new programming language. Remember that if you are building a bot like this, you should ALWAYS read and follow our Twitter Automation Policy to ensure that you are building an app that is compliant with our acceptable use guidelines.

Feeling inspired yet? Here’s what you need to get started on your own projects!

To begin creating an app with the Twitter API, you will need an approved developer account. You will also need to make sure you have read and understand our Developer Agreement and Policy, Display Requirements, and/or the Twitter Rules.  The reason we are able to share such an open and available Developer Platform is that we have put clear guidelines in place to ensure the safety and privacy of all people on Twitter.

We also have a video which walks you through what you need to build an application in a step-by-step fashion. Finally, if you are a teacher be sure to take a look at our playbook for education to learn how best to position your students for success when using the Twitter API. You should also let us know on the Twitter Community Forums or Tweet us at @TwitterDev if you or a student of yours builds anything with the Twitter API as we would love to share your success with the larger academic community!