Library Website – SIES GST

A full-stack web application for the SIES Graduate School of Technology (GST) college library. The site lets students browse e-resources, view syllabus and previous year question papers (PYQs) and stay updated with library news. An admin panel allows authorised staff to manage the database directly.

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Table of Contents

• Project Structure
• Tech Stack
• Getting Started
• Environment Variables
• Available Scripts
• Features
• Deployment
• Contributing

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Project Structure

Libray-Website/
├── Frontend/        # React + Vite client application
├── Backend/         # Node.js + Express API server
├── migrate-db/      # MongoDB migration utilities
└── README.md        # This file

See the Frontend README and Backend README for folder-specific details.

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Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Frontend	React 18, Vite, Tailwind CSS, Zustand, React Router v6
Backend	Node.js, Express 4, MongoDB (Mongoose), JWT, Cloudinary
Auth	JSON Web Tokens, bcrypt
Storage	Cloudinary (file uploads)
Hosting	Vercel (frontend), Render (backend)

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Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js ≥ 20
• npm ≥ 10
• A running MongoDB instance (local or Atlas)
• A Cloudinary account for file uploads

1 – Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/Sourish-Kanna/Libray-Website.git
cd Libray-Website

2 – Start the backend

cd Backend
cp example.env .env   # fill in the values (see Environment Variables)
npm install
npm run dev

3 – Start the frontend

cd ../Frontend
npm install
npm run dev

The frontend dev server is available at http://localhost:5173. API requests are sent directly to the base URL configured in Frontend/src/Store/baseapi.js (which by default points to the deployed backend). To use a locally running backend instead, update the API_BASE_URL variable in that file to http://localhost:8000/api/v1.

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Environment Variables

Backend environment variables are documented in Backend/example.env:

Variable	Description
PORT	Port the Express server listens on (default 8000)
MONGODB_URL	MongoDB connection string for the main database
MONGODB_URL_ADMIN	MongoDB connection string for the admin database
DB_NAME	Name of the main database
CORS_ORIGIN	Reserved for future use — CORS origins are currently hard-coded in Backend/src/app.js
ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET	Secret key for signing access JWTs
ACCESS_TOKEN_EXPIRY	Access token expiry duration (e.g. 1d)
REFRESH_TOKEN_SECRET	Secret key for signing refresh JWTs
REFRESH_TOKEN_EXPIRY	Refresh token expiry duration (e.g. 10d)
CLOUDINARY_CLOUD_NAME	Cloudinary cloud name
CLOUDINARY_API_KEY	Cloudinary API key
CLOUDINARY_API_SECRET	Cloudinary API secret

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Available Scripts

From the root of each sub-project:

Command	Description
npm run dev	Start the development server
npm run build	Build for production (frontend only)
npm run preview	Preview the production build (frontend only)
npm run lint	Run ESLint
npm start	Start in production mode (backend only)

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Features

• 📚 E-Resources – Browse and download study materials

• 📝 Syllabus & PYQs – Access syllabi and previous year question papers filtered by branch, year, and semester

• 📰 News – Latest library announcements

• 🔗 Quick Links – Useful external links for students

• 🔐 Admin Panel – Protected database viewer for authorised staff

• ☁️ Cloudinary Uploads – File uploads served via Cloudinary CDN

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Deployment

Service	Purpose
Vercel	Frontend deployment
Render	Backend deployment (render.yaml)

Live site: https://siesgstlibrary.vercel.app

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Contributing

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feat/your-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -m 'feat: add your feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin feat/your-feature)
5. Open a Pull Request