Message Node

A full-stack social feed application built by modernizing an older React project with a TypeScript + Express + Prisma backend.

The project focuses on clean backend architecture, authentication, authorization, validation, database access, and file uploads.

---

🚧 Status

In active development.

Implemented

• TypeScript + Express backend
• Prisma + MySQL
• User registration and login
• JWT authentication
• Argon2id password hashing
• Authentication middleware
• Post CRUD operations
• Post ownership and authorization
• Pagination
• User status management
• Image uploads with Multer
• Local image serving and cleanup
• Zod request validation
• Centralized error handling
• React frontend integration

Planned

• Automated tests
• Production image storage
• Login validation
• Rate limiting and security hardening
• API documentation
• Frontend modernization
• Production deployment

---

🛠️ Tech Stack

Frontend

• React
• React Router
• CSS
• Fetch API

Backend

• Node.js
• Express
• TypeScript
• Prisma
• MySQL
• Zod
• Multer
• Argon2
• JSON Web Tokens

---

🏗️ Architecture

Message Node follows a layered backend architecture:

Request
   │
   ▼
Middleware
   │
   ▼
Route
   │
   ▼
Controller
   │
   ▼
Service
   │
   ▼
Prisma
   │
   ▼
MySQL

Controllers handle HTTP concerns while services contain application and database logic.

Authentication and authorization are handled through middleware and service-level ownership checks.

---

🔐 Authentication

Authentication uses JWT with Argon2id password hashing.

Protected requests use:

Authorization: Bearer <token>

Authenticated user information is propagated through the Express request and used for authorization and resource ownership checks.

---

📝 Posts

Users can:

• Create posts
• View posts
• View individual posts
• Edit their own posts
• Delete their own posts
• Upload images
• Replace post images

Posts are associated with their creator through a Prisma relationship.

---

🖼️ Image Uploads

Images are uploaded using Multer and currently stored on the local filesystem.

Images are served through:

/images/<filename>

When posts are updated or deleted, associated image files are cleaned up.

Production object storage is planned for a future deployment.

---

📡 API

Authentication

Method	Endpoint	Description
PUT	/auth/signup	Register
POST	/auth/login	Login

Posts

Method	Endpoint	Description
GET	/feed/posts	Get user's posts
GET	/feed/post/:postId	Get a post
POST	/feed/post	Create a post
PUT	/feed/post/:postId	Update a post
DELETE	/feed/post/:postId	Delete a post

Status

Method	Endpoint	Description
GET	/status	Get user status
PATCH	/status	Update user status

Protected endpoints require authentication.

---

📦 Running Locally

Backend

cd backend
npm install
npx prisma generate
npm run dev

The backend runs on:

http://localhost:8080

Frontend

cd frontend
npm install
npm start

The frontend runs on:

http://localhost:3000

---

🔐 Environment Variables

Create a .env file in the backend:

DB_HOST=localhost
DB_PORT=3306
DB_USER=...
DB_PASSWORD=...
DB_NAME=message-node

JWT_SECRET=...
PORT=8080

Never commit real credentials or secrets.

---

🗺️ Roadmap

• Automated testing
• Production image storage
• API documentation
• Rate limiting
• Production logging
• Security hardening
• Docker deployment
• CI/CD
• Frontend modernization
• Production deployment

---

🎯 Project Goals

Message Node is being developed as a practical full-stack project with an emphasis on:

• Type-safe backend development
• Clean architecture
• Secure authentication
• Resource authorization
• Runtime validation
• Maintainable database access
• Production-ready engineering practices

---

📄 License

This project is currently a personal learning/development project.