Protothon 2026 is a full-stack hackathon management platform developed to streamline registrations, participant management, abstract submission, evaluation, and shortlisting through a centralized web application.
Organizing a hackathon involves much more than collecting registrations.
Event organizers need to securely manage participant information, authenticate users, collect project abstracts, review submissions, update team statuses, and maintain records throughout the event.
Protothon 2026 was developed to digitize this complete workflow.
Instead of relying on multiple spreadsheets and manual coordination, the platform provides a centralized system where participants can register, manage their submissions, and track their application status, while organizers can efficiently administer registrations, review project ideas, shortlist teams, and export participant information whenever required.
The project was designed with simplicity, reliability, and maintainability in mind while supporting the complete lifecycle of a student innovation event.
Protothon 2026 currently provides:
- Team Registration Portal
- Secure JWT Authentication
- Student Dashboard
- Admin Dashboard
- Abstract Submission & Editing
- Registration Deadline Enforcement
- Team Status Management (Pending / Selected / Rejected)
- MongoDB Atlas Integration
- Excel Export for Team Data
- Responsive User Interface
- RESTful Backend API
The application follows a client-server architecture.
Participants
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React Frontend (Vercel)
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REST API
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Express.js Backend (Render)
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MongoDB Atlas
The frontend communicates with the backend using REST APIs, while MongoDB Atlas stores all participant information. Authentication is handled through JWT, ensuring that only authenticated teams can access their dashboard.
- React
- React Router
- Axios
- Tailwind CSS
- Framer Motion
- React Toastify
- Node.js
- Express.js
- MongoDB
- Mongoose
- JWT
- bcrypt
- ExcelJS
- dotenv
- Vercel
- Render
- MongoDB Atlas
The backend follows a modular architecture where responsibilities are separated into dedicated components.
Business logic is distributed across:
- Routes
- Models
- Middleware
- Utility Functions
This separation keeps authentication, registration, dashboard operations, administrative actions, and database interactions independent, making the project easier to maintain and extend.
Participants register by providing:
- Team Information
- Leader Details
- Member Details
- Domain Selection
- Problem Statement
- Project Abstract
Passwords are securely hashed before being stored in the database.
The platform implements JWT-based authentication.
Authenticated participants can:
- Access their dashboard
- View team details
- Edit project abstracts before the submission deadline
- View current selection status
Protected routes are secured through authentication middleware.
The participant dashboard allows teams to:
- View registration details
- View selected domain
- View project abstract
- Update abstract before the deadline
- Track application status
The administrative interface allows organizers to:
- View all registered teams
- Review submitted abstracts
- Update team status
- Export registrations to Excel
- Manage participant information
Several architectural decisions significantly influenced the development of Protothon 2026.
Rather than placing all business logic inside a single server file, responsibilities were separated into routes, middleware, models, and utility modules.
This organization improved readability and simplified debugging.
Passwords are hashed using bcrypt before storage, while JWT tokens secure protected routes.
This ensures participant credentials remain protected throughout the application.
MongoDB Atlas was selected because team registrations naturally fit a document-based structure, allowing leader information, team members, and project details to be stored together.
Administrative workflows such as status updates, participant management, and Excel exports significantly reduced manual work during event coordination.
Unlike many academic projects that remain local demonstrations, Protothon 2026 was deployed and used during an actual college innovation event.
The platform successfully handled:
- Live participant registrations
- Team authentication
- Abstract submissions
- Administrative shortlisting
- Database management
- Excel report generation
Maintaining the application during active usage provided practical experience in production debugging, deployment management, live database operations, and responding to real user issues under time constraints.
Developing Protothon 2026 provided practical experience with:
- Full-stack web development
- REST API development
- MongoDB Atlas
- JWT Authentication
- Password Hashing
- Deployment using Render & Vercel
- Production debugging
- Database administration
- Live application maintenance
- Event management system design
- Software deployment workflows
Perhaps the most valuable lesson from this project was understanding that developing software is only part of the journey. Deploying, maintaining, debugging, and supporting a live application used by real participants introduced an entirely different set of engineering challenges that significantly strengthened my practical development skills.
- Judge Authentication
- Faculty Dashboard
- Automated Shortlisting
- Certificate Generation
- Attendance Management
- Analytics Dashboard
- Multi-event Support
- Docker Deployment
- Role-Based Access Control
- Audit Logs
Protothon 2026 was developed to simplify the organization of student innovation events through software.
Rather than focusing only on registrations, the platform was designed to support the complete lifecycle of an event—from participant onboarding and authentication to abstract submission, evaluation, shortlisting, and administrative management.
Throughout development, emphasis was placed on building a reliable, maintainable, and user-friendly system capable of supporting real event operations rather than simply demonstrating technical concepts.
Protothon 2026 was developed as the official event management platform for the Protothon 2026 innovation event.
Special thanks to:
- Dr. R. Thilakarasi (Head of the Department) for her approval, encouragement, and valuable suggestions.
- Sangeethapriya J (Staff Coordinator) for her continuous guidance and support throughout the event.
The project also benefited from the dedication and teamwork of the student coordinators, whose collective efforts contributed to the successful planning and execution of Protothon 2026.