Impactall: Building the Platform Behind Be Curious
The backend, admin dashboard and initial web and mobile app behind Impactall's Be Curious learning platform.
About Impactall
Impactall Solutions is an Indian ed-tech startup, founded in 2017 in Noida by Srishti Mittal, Praveen Sharma and Supriya Raina, building 3D and VR simulations to make complex school subjects easier to grasp — 360-degree virtual tours, cross-sectional 3D models and interactive lessons under the Be Curious brand. CharPixel built the platform's foundation over a three-month engagement in 2020: the Node.js backend and API, the admin dashboard, and the initial web and mobile app, before handing the project over to Impactall's own engineering team to continue building on. Impactall has since grown Be Curious to more than 100 simulations and its own VR features.
- Backend API on Node.js and Hapi, with MongoDB as the content and user store.
- Admin dashboard for managing classes, chapters, topics and content.
- Content modelled as class → chapter → topic → subtopic, with comments, likes and followers attached.
- Initial web and mobile app for browsing and viewing published content.
- Deployed on AWS with a documented handover to Impactall's own engineering team.
- Impactall has since grown Be Curious to 100+ simulations and its own VR features, and been named among India's notable VR startups.
- Client
- Impactall
- Industry
- EdTech — 3D & VR Simulations
- Business type
- Ed-tech startup building 3D and VR learning simulations, and the classroom app that delivers them
- Website
- impactall.co.in
What the platform had to solve
A startup building 3D and VR learning content still needs an ordinary product underneath it — accounts, a content library organised by class and chapter, an admin system for the team publishing simulations, and a web and mobile app that can actually load them. Impactall's brief to CharPixel was narrower and more concrete than the product's long-term vision: get that foundation built and running in production quickly enough for the team to start publishing content and iterating on their own.
What made it difficult
A real product in three months
An early-stage platform needs to move from concept to a production backend, admin tools and a working app fast enough to start onboarding schools and publishing content — with no runway for over-engineering, but a foundation that still has to hold as content and users grow.
Content that has to scale by subject, not just by volume
School content organises naturally into class, chapter, topic and subtopic — the data model had to reflect that structure directly rather than treating every lesson as a flat, interchangeable record.
A social layer on top of a content library
Comments, likes, views and followers needed to sit on the same content records as the curriculum structure, so engagement stays attributed to the right class and chapter rather than tracked separately.
Independent web, mobile and admin surfaces
Students browse the app, Impactall's team publishes from the admin dashboard, and both draw on the same API — keeping those three surfaces consistent from day one avoids drift once the team is building independently.
How we approached it
- 01
Node.js and Hapi backend
A REST API on Node.js and the Hapi framework, with MongoDB as the content and user store, documented with Swagger so the team could work against it independently.
- 02
Class-chapter-topic content model
Content structured to match how a curriculum is actually organised, with subtopics and media attached at the level they belong to rather than flattened into a single content table.
- 03
Admin dashboard
A dashboard for the Impactall team to manage classes, chapters, topics and published content without engineering involvement.
- 04
Web and mobile app on the same API
Initial web and mobile clients built against the same backend, so a piece of content published once is available on both.
- 05
AWS deployment with a documented handover
EC2, Route 53 for domains and S3 for file storage, deployed via Ansible, with the whole setup — and a full technical handover — transferred to Impactall's own team at the end of the engagement.
What it was built with
The technologies named for this project.
Backend
Node.js
Hapi
Database
MongoDB
Infrastructure
AWS EC2
AWS S3
AWS Route 53
Ansible
API
Swagger
How the system fits together
The structural decisions behind the platform.
- 01
A modular route → controller → service structure, with each module communicating only through services — set up to allow a later move to microservices without a rewrite.
- 02
Separate subdomains for the public app, the API and the admin dashboard.
- 03
Content modelled as class → chapter → topic → subtopic, so curriculum structure is enforced by the schema rather than by convention.
What the platform does
Content library
Classes, chapters, topics and subtopics, with media and simulations attached at the right level.
Admin publishing tools
Managing curriculum structure and content without needing an engineer.
Comments, likes and followers
Engagement features attached directly to content records.
Web and mobile clients
Initial apps for browsing and viewing published content.
API documentation
A Swagger-documented API so the growing team could build against it independently.
What this project involved
Web Application Development
Scalable web applications on modern frameworks, engineered for first-load performance and sustained load.
Mobile App Development
Native and cross-platform iOS and Android apps, built for real network conditions rather than office Wi-Fi.
Custom Software Development
Bespoke systems shaped around your operations, integrated with the tools and data you already run on.
Impactall: common questions
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Start a project01
What did CharPixel build for Impactall?
The platform's foundation, over a three-month engagement in 2020: the Node.js and Hapi backend and API, the admin dashboard, and the initial web and mobile app — deployed on AWS and handed over to Impactall's own engineering team to continue building on.
02
Did CharPixel build Impactall's VR and 3D simulation features?
No. That work, and the platform's growth to more than 100 simulations, happened after CharPixel's engagement ended in mid-2020, under Impactall's own team. CharPixel built the backend, admin tools and initial apps the platform launched on.
03
What is Be Curious?
Impactall's classroom app, offering 360-degree virtual tours, cross-sectional 3D models and interactive simulations designed to make complex school topics easier to understand — aimed at closing the gap between theoretical learning and how a concept actually works.
04
How was the content structured?
As a curriculum hierarchy — class, chapter, topic and subtopic — with comments, likes, views and follower activity attached directly to content records, so engagement data stays connected to the right part of the curriculum.
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