/twutter

Like Twitter but worse

Primary LanguagePython

twutter

It's like Twitter but worse.

https://twutter.netlify.app

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This is a social media site that implements many of the basic features and functionality in other sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instragram etc.

These include:

  • Authentication
    • Sign up with SMS/email verification
    • Login/logout
    • Reset password with SMS/email verification
    • Update contact info with SMS/email verification
  • User accounts
    • Profile picture and bio
    • Private and public accounts
    • Account deletion
  • Posts
    • Text and image posts
    • Private and public posts
    • Like and comment on posts
    • Edit and delete your own posts
  • Following
    • Follow and unfollow users
    • See following and followers lists of users
  • Feeds
    • See feed of posts from accounts you follow
    • See posts you've made on your profile
    • See posts from a user on their home page
    • See posts you've liked
    • These feeds can be sorted by
      • Current popularity (using the Hacker News algorithm)
      • Currently discussed (same algorithm as above but with comments instead of likes)
      • Most/least liked
      • Most/least commented
      • Newest and oldest
  • Search
    • Search for accounts by their username
  • Themed bots
    • There are 14 themed bot accounts that make an automated post related to their theme each day at noon. For example, there is a cat bot that posts a cat image each day, and a fact bot that posts an interesting fact each day.

Below is the stack and some implementation details.

Backend

  • The backend is done in Python with Flask and PostgreSQL.
  • It's hosted on Heroku.
  • Passwords and reset codes are salted and hashed with SHA256.
  • JWTs are used for encrypted authentication with the frontend.
  • Used Python's smtplib and the Twilio API for senidng one time passwords (OTPs) through SMS and email.
  • Used AWS's S3 for image storage.
  • Used Heroku Scheduler to automate themed bot account posts.

Frontend

  • The frontend is done with Angular and TypeScript.
  • It's hosted on Netlify.
  • Frontend makes HTTP API requests to the backend and uses JWTs for encrypted authentication.
  • Browser cookies are used for sesion management.

To run the backend:

  • Must set required environment variables (see env.sh).
  • Must have a PostgreSQL database with the schema in backend/sql/setup.sql.
  • Must have Python 3 installed (currently using 3.10.5).
$ source env.sh
$ pip install -r requirements.txt
$ python3 wsgi.py

To run the frontend:

  • Must have npm and the Angular CLI installed (currently using npm 8.11.0, Angular 10.1.6 and node 16.15.1).
$ npm i
$ ng serve