Direct Message Backend

Welcome to Direct Message, a real-time chat application built using Spring Boot, PostgreSQL, and WebSockets. This backend provides robust features for messaging, user management, and media handling, with secure authentication and cloud-based storage.

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Features

Authentication

• JWT-Based Authentication: Ensures secure user sessions.
• Email Verification: Verifies user emails during registration.
• Two-Factor Authentication: Integrates Google Authenticator for additional security.

Messaging Features

• Send Messages: Exchange text and media messages in real-time.
• Edit/Delete Messages: Modify or remove sent messages.
• Reactions: React to messages with emojis.
• Typing Indicators: See when someone is typing.
• Read Notifications: Notify users when their messages are read.
• Message History: View past messages with powerful search capabilities.

Media Handling

• Media Messages: Send and receive images, videos, or other file types.
• AWS S3 Integration: Media files are securely stored in Amazon S3.

User Management

• Edit Profile: Update user details and profile picture.
• Change Status: Set a custom user status.
• Friend Requests: Send, accept, or reject friend requests.

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Additional Features

API Documentation

• OpenAPI (Swagger) Docs: Explore and interact with the API using Swagger UI.
  The Swagger documentation is automatically generated and accessible at:

    http://<HOST>:<PORT>/swagger-ui.html
  

Logging

• Logs: All application logs, including error and debug logs, are automatically generated and stored in the /logs directory.
  These logs help with monitoring, debugging, and auditing application activity.

Database Auditing

• Auditing for All Entities: The application tracks creation and update metadata for all database entities:
• Created By: The user who created the entity.
• Updated By: The user who last updated the entity.
• Created At: The timestamp when the entity was created.
• Updated At: The timestamp when the entity was last updated.

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Prerequisites

Tools and Services Required

• Docker: To run the PostgreSQL database using the provided Docker Compose file.
• AWS S3: For storing media files.
• Google Authenticator: For 2FA.
• SMTP Email Server: For email verification.
• Java 23: Required to build and run the Spring Boot application.

How to Run

1. Set Up Configuration Values

Ensure that you have filled in all the necessary configuration values in the application.yml file, including:

• Database connection details

   spring:
     datasource:
       url: jdbc:postgresql://<DB_HOST>:<DB_PORT>/<DB_NAME>
       username: <DB_USERNAME>
       password: <DB_PASSWORD>

• SMTP mail server settings

     mail:
      host: <MAIL_HOST>
      port: <MAIL_PORT>
      username: <MAIL_USERNAME>
      password: <MAIL_PASSWORD>

  • If you don't have an SMTP server and need a local solution for email testing, you can use Maildev. It's an easy-to-use SMTP server that captures sent emails for debugging purposes.

    1. Install Maildev: You can install Maildev via Docker. If you don't have Docker installed, follow the Docker installation guide.

    2. Run the following command to pull and start Maildev:

       docker run -d -p 1080:1080 -p 1025:1025 maildev/maildev

• JWT secret key and expiration times

   jwt:
     secretkey: <JWT_SECRET_KEY>
     expiration: <JWT_EXPIRATION_TIME>
     refreshExpiration: <JWT_REFRESH_EXPIRATION_TIME>
  

• AWS S3 settings

    aws:
      s3:
        bucketName: <S3_BUCKET_NAME>
        region: <S3_REGION>
        accessKeyId: <AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID>
        secretAccessKey: <AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY>

• General configuration

  general:
    messages:
      delete-minutes: <DELETE_WINDOW_IN_MINUTES>  
      edit-minutes: <EDIT_WINDOW_IN_MINUTES> 
    users:
      admin:
        email: <ADMIN_EMAIL>
        password: <ADMIN_PASSWORD>
      status:
        inactive-threshold-minutes: <INACTIVE_WINDOW>
      confirmation-token:
        expiration-minutes: <CONFIRMATION_TOKEN_EXPIRATION_TIME>
  

2. Run PostgreSQL with Docker Compose

The project includes a docker-compose.yml file that can be used to easily run a PostgreSQL instance. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Ensure Docker is installed on your machine.
2. In the root directory of the project, run the following command to start the PostgreSQL container:

docker-compose up

3. Build and Run the Spring Boot Application

To build and run the backend server using Gradle:

1. Clone the repository to your local machine.

   git clone https://github.com/Gemois/directmessage.git

2. Navigate to the project directory and run the following command:

./gradlew bootRun

3. The application will start and be accessible on the port configured in application.yml.