Zonnect

Finished the login page and reused the left/right layout from the signup page.
Fixed issues with Axios base URL and corrected imports from react-router to react-router-dom.
Set up and tested Vercel deployment, including adding and updating the vercel.json configuration.

Built the signup form UI, including name, email, and other inputs along with a submit button. Added a left sidebar layout and created a small animated border component!

Implemented the signup flow in the auth store,. On successful signup, user state gets updated, a success toast is shown. Also added error handling with toast messages.

Set up Zustand and Axios , and created separate pages for routes. Added an auth store and implemented /checkAuth with useEffect. Also fixed a CORS issue.

Added a loading screen, page loader, and restricted the chat page.

Set up the initial frontend and configured Tailwind CSS for styling. Installed DaisyUI and organized the project by creating router, components, and pages folders. Also added a simple base background and grid for base UI.

Added the sendMessage controller to handle sending messages(TODO) & storing them in the database. Also implemented the getChatPartners functionality to fetch users. Updated the routing flow to protectRoute middleware runs before other routes, so only authenticated users can access.

done with three new endpoints & controllers

• send message
• get all contacts
• get messages with userId
  next: complete last endpoint and finally move towards UI/Frontend

Implemented the basic message middleware and set up the message routes. Added a base structure for handling message-related requests, along with a simple message filter for processing messages properly. Also created a get contacts route to fetch user contacts. The core messaging structure is now in place and ready for further development.
also used arcjet to disable bots!

Created the MongoDB message model to store chat messages in the database, setting up the basic schema required for handling messages in the app. Also fixed an issue where Cloudinary wasn’t installed in the backend folder, which was causing errors earlier.

Formatted the backend code. Fixed issues related to env.js and environment variable handling/arcjet/export that were causing problems during deployment. After resolving the configuration issues, the backend has been successfully deployed and is now live. Next step is to start implementing the message endpoints for the chat functionality.

Also have changes the app name to Zonnect!

Implemented rate limiting using Arcjet. Installed Arcjet and set up the initial configuration along with a separate library file for managing the rate limiting logic! Also used sliding window algo

Added functionality for updating the user’s profile picture. Integrated Cloudinary for image storage and handling, allowing profile pictures to be uploaded and stored externally instead of locally. will be implementing base64 image workflow soon!

Implemented the auth middleware to protect private routes. Added proper next() handling and basic error catching to ensure requests move correctly through the middleware chain. Also imported protectRoute where needed and fixed a small typo that was causing issues earlier. Protected route handling is now set up and working properly.

Added login and logout endpoints, and resolved a MongoDB DNS connection issue that was causing problems earlier. The authentication workflow is now functioning smoothly: a user can sign up, receive a confirmation email, log in, and log out without any issues. The basic auth flow is now fully operational.

Finally, the welcome email is working! It now sends a welcome email as soon as a user signs up. Currently, it’s using Resend’s development mail, but I’ll switch it to a custom domain soon.

Auth controller endpoint, minor frontend tweaks & updated userModel. changes name from “light” to “leght”

Devlog:
Created db.js
Completed the signup endpoint in the auth controller
Set up MongoDB
Refactored code by moving functions from routes to controllers

Created separate base routes for /api/messages and /api/auth. Started working on the backend structure and deployed the frontend to Vercel and the backend to Render.

Initial devlog: set up the project and basic structure.