Zoo central

A Social Media Blogging platform using Express.js and MongoDB

via https://github.com/winterrrrrff/realWorld-server
PS: for proof of work, please visit "notes" folder where I documented my troubleshooting journey as build this project.

Functionalities

• Implemented the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture.
• Personalised feed for each user, alongwith pagination.

• Favourite articles.
• Follow author of articles.
• Comments on each article.
• Unique and multiple tags across articles.

• Implemented custom CORS to secure server
• Implemented Bcrypt for hashing user password at login and signup both.
• Implemented Slugify for CRUD operations on articles as event listener “save”
• Implemented authentication service using JSON Web Token (JWT) for secure access to user data and for CRUD operations on article data.
• Integrated Optional JWT for accessing article.

Project Tree

├── app.js
├── bin
│   └── www
├── config
│   ├── allowedOrigins.js
│   ├── corsOptions.js
│   └── dbConnect.js
├── controllers
│   ├── articlesController.js
│   ├── commentController.js
│   ├── profileController.js
│   ├── tagsController.js
│   └── userController.js
├── middleware
│   ├── verifyJWT.js
│   └── verifyJWTOptional.js
├── models
│   ├── Article.js
│   ├── Comment.js
│   ├── Tags.js
│   └── User.js
├── package-lock.json
├── package.json
├── public
│   ├── images
│   ├── javascripts
│   └── stylesheets
│       └── style.css
├── routes
│   ├── articlesRoutes.js
│   ├── commentRoutes.js
│   ├── profileRoutes.js
│   ├── root.js
│   ├── tagRoutes.js
│   ├── testRoutes.js
│   └── userRoutes.js
├── test
└── views
    ├── error.jade
    ├── index.html
    ├── index.jade
    └── layout.jade

Project Setup

• clone the repository
• check if npm is installed via npm -v
• run npm install on root directory to install dependencies
• create a .env file in root directory and add the following variable
• run npm run start

Environment variables

# .env

NODE_ENV = development
PORT = 4200
DATABASE_URI = mongodb://localhost/mydatabase;
ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET = couldHaveRickRolledYouHere;

DB Design

• Articles Schema
• User Schema
• Comments Schema
• Tags Schema

DB Tables

• User - username, password, email, bio, image, favouriteArticles, followingUsers, timestamps
• Article - slug, title, description, body, tagList, author._id, favouritesCount, comments._id, timestamps
• Tags - tagName, articles._id
• Comment - body, author, article._id, timestamps

DB Choices and Tradeoffs

• Scaling limitation
  • Article model - contains an array structure for storing list of comment._id of comments made on each Article.
  • Article model - contains an array structure for storing list of tags added to each Article.
  • User model - contains an array structure for storing list of article_.id favourited article by each User.
• Indexing done on -
  • Article model - slug
  • User model - email
• Unique validation -
  • Article model - slug
  • User model - username , email
  • Tags model - tagName
• Required field are
  • Article model - title , description , body
  • User model - username , email , password
  • Tags model - tagName
  • Comment model - body
• Only one access_token_secret is used for all the accounts registration and login. Drawback: data can be forged if this secret is leaked