📱 Gather

Gather is a modular mobile data collection platform designed for field research, ecological surveys, and flexible scientific use cases. Built using React Native and powered by Expo, it supports structured data entry through photos, videos, geolocation, and numerical input — all synced to a cloud backend.

🧪 Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF)
🔬 Developed by the Saint Louis University Computer Vision Lab
🌱 In collaboration with the New Roots for Restoration Biology Integration Institute (NRR BII)

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🚀 Features

• Offline-first mobile app for structured survey collection
• Supports photos, videos, maps, audio, numeric/text input
• On-device validation and conditional task logic
• Over-the-air (OTA) updates + internal distribution builds
• Integrates with EAS, Firebase, and MongoDB (configurable)

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🛠 Getting Started

To run Gather locally, make sure you have Node.js, Expo CLI, and Yarn installed.

1. Clone the Repo

git clone https://github.com/your-org/gather.git
cd gather
yarn install

2. Start the Development Server

npx expo start

Use the QR code in your terminal to open the app on a physical device with a development build.

📖 Expo Development Builds

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🔧 Building with EAS

We use Expo Application Services (EAS) for production builds and OTA (over-the-air) updates.

Common Build Commands

eas build --platform all --profile development
# or
eas build --platform all --profile testing
# or
eas build --platform all --profile production

OTA Update Command

eas update --channel production --message "Update message here"

📖 EAS Build Docs 📖 EAS Update Docs

📡 Distribution

Internal distribution builds are created for both Android and iOS platforms. You can access builds and install them via QR code links or download pages hosted in your team's documentation or GitHub Releases.

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🛠️ Developer Notes

We follow a conventional Git workflow using feature branches and a linear commit history.

Versioning & Automation

We use release-please and Conventional Commits to automate versioning, changelogs, and triggering builds via GitHub Actions.

• feat: → minor version bump (e.g., 1.2.0)

• fix: → patch version bump (e.g., 1.2.1)

• feat!: or fix!: → major version bump (e.g., 2.0.0)

  Additional Commit Types

Type	Purpose
chore:	Routine tasks or maintenance (e.g., config updates)
docs:	Documentation changes only
style:	Code style changes (e.g., formatting, whitespace)
refactor:	Code changes that neither fix a bug nor add a feature
perf:	Changes that improve performance
test:	Adding or refactoring tests (no production code changes)
ci:	Changes to CI/CD pipeline or workflow configuration
build:	Changes that affect the build system or dependencies

Build Triggers

• Merging to main:
  • If the version ends in .0 (e.g., 1.1.0, 2.0.0), a production build is triggered
  • Otherwise, an OTA update is triggered
• Merging to development triggers a testing build
• Opening a PR to main triggers a testing build
• Pushing to any branch named feature/* with [build] in the commit message triggers a development build

Merge Strategy

We use Rebase and Merge to maintain a linear commit history, which is required for release-please to function correctly.

📚 Acknowledgments

This project is made possible through the support of the NSF and the NRR Biology Integration Institute and is part of ongoing research into scalable ecological monitoring and intelligent data workflows.

For collaboration inquiries, please contact austin.carnahan@slu.edu