CS1XA3 Project03 - Social Media Clone

Usage

• Install the conda environment with conda install -c anaconda django
• Activate the django environment with conda activate djangoenv
• Run the server from your local machine with python manage.py runserver localhost:8000
• Run the project on the mac1xa3.ca server with python manage.py runserver localhost:10051
• Initial Login Credentials(already set-up):
  • Username - Merlin
  • Password - 'pf2Yc9xvAS'
• Navigate throughout the project using the Navbar
• Quit the server by pressing CTRL-C in the terminal

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Objective 1

~Description: Objective 1 is responsible for properly logging in existing users or routing to a signup page for new users. Initially a new user was created using the python shell (python manage.py shell) and the UserInfo class in models.py The signup page is implemented using appropriate forms and url routing.

• Login/Logout

  • Uses the in-built form for authenticating the user (from django.contrib.auth.forms import AuthenticationForm)
  • The login_view function handles the POST request and authenticates the user and redirects them to the messages page.
  • The logout_view function using the logout request redirects the user back to the login page.
  • The from django.contrib.auth import authenticate, login, logout module is important to properly authenticate, login and logout the user.
  • The login.djhtml file renders the views using some css assets.
  • The url path is routed as path('logout/', views.logout_view,name='logout_view') in the login/urls.py file.

• Signup

  • Uses the in-built form for adding a new user (from django.contrib.auth.forms import UserCreationForm)
  • The signup_view and create_view functions handle the POST request and create the signup form for new users. It also uses the UserInfo class models.UserInfo.objects.create_user_info(username=username,password=raw_password)to add the user credentials. Redirects to the messages page.
  • The signup.djhtml file renders the views and also uses a {% csrf_token %} to prevent csrf attacks
  • The url path is routed as path('create/', views.create_view, name='create_view')

~Exceptions: If the /e/macid/... is incorrect, the script redirects to the login page

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Objective 2

~Description: Objective 2 is responsible for adding User Profiles and Interests.

• Uses the variables in the UserInfo class to display the currently logged in user's attributes including Employment, Location, Birthday and Interests
• The variables are used in the socical_base.djhtml file so they are displayed upon rendering
• A for loop is used to display the user's interests which makes use of the label in the Interest class

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Objective 3

~Description: Objective 3 is resposible for providing the user with forms to change their current password and update their personal attributes

• Password Change

  • Uses the in-built form for changing the password (from django.contrib.auth.forms import PasswordChangeForm)
  • The account_view function handles the password change form using the update_session_auth_hash module and renders the account.djhtml file
  • The account.djhtml file displays the view and uses a {% csrf_token %} to prevent csrf attacks
  • The url path is routed as path('account/', views.account_view,name='account_view')

• Update

  • Uses HTML input fields to add and display user information
  • The update_view function handles the POST request, update form and renders the account.djhtml file
  • request.POST.get is used to retrieve the user attributes from the UserInfo class
  • Instances are made to filter and add the interests of the user
  • All interest submissions are added to the list of interests
  • The corresponding variables are placed in the account.djhtml file to display them.
  • Once the user clicks submit, they are redirected back to the messages page
  • The url path is routed as path('change_u/', views.update_view, name='update_view')

~Exception: In the PasswordChange form, if the user's entered password does not match twice, they will be redirected back to the login page.

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Objective 4

~Description: Objective 4 is responsible for displaying people on the People page

• The people_view function uses lists and session variables to display users who are NOT friends of the currently logged in user
• The page displays 1 person at first and more are revealed upon clicking the More button
• The More button is linked to send an AJAX POST from the people.js file to the people_view
• The people.djhtml file renders the view and displays the other user's attributes
• The url path is routed as path('people/', views.people_view,name='people_view')

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Objective 5

~Description: Objective 5 is responsible for allowing the user to send friend requests

• The id in people.djhtml is made unique to each username using the forloop
• The Friend Request button is disabled after it is clicked
• A for loop is used in the people.djhtml file to iterate over the friend_requests list and display the username of the people in that list
• The friend_request_view function uses the UserInfo and FriendRequest class to assign variables with list slicing to get the required fields.
• The people_view function uses the FriendRequest class to render the list in the loop and add it to our empty size list which is used in people.djhtml to display the users
• The url path is routed as path('friendrequest/', views.friend_request_view,name='friend_request_view')

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Objective 6

~Description: Objective 6 is responsible for allowing the user to Accept or Decline the friend requests they receive.

• The id in people.djhtml is made unique to each username using the forloop
• The functions in people.js allow the user to Accept or Decline the request by sending POST requests to the accept_decline_view function with the corresponding button id
• The accept_decline_view function retrieves the data variable('decision'), checking it's first and second index to then add the user who sent the friend request to the list of current user's friends, updating both their interfaces. Otherwise if the current user declined the request, it deletes it.
• The url path is routed as path('acceptdecline/', views.accept_decline_view,name='accept_decline_view')

~Exception: A HttpResponseNotFound is returned if a POST method was prematurely called without a decision

~NOTE: The user might have to double click the accept/decline button to allow the decision.

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Objective 7

~Description: Objective 7 displays all the friends of the currently logged in user

• A for loop is used in messages.djhtml (for f in user_info.friends.all) to display the list of friends of the currently logged in user

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Objective 8

~Description: Objective 8 allows the user the accesibility to submitting posts

• The functions in messages.js handle the AJAX POST request when the Post button is clicked. The contents are routed to post_submit_view
• The page is reloaded using location.reload() if the post was a success
• The post_submit_view function handles the submission of the post. A POST request is assigned to the postContent variable and using the Post class and it's attributes, it is added , then displayed on the messages page
• The contents of the post-text id are routed to the post_submit_view
• The url path is routed as path('postsubmit/', views.post_submit_view,name='post_submit_view')

~Exception: A HttpResponseNotFound is returned if a POST method was prematurely called without referencing postContent

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Objective 9

~Description: Objective 9 handles the display of all the posts, inlcuding the logged in user's and their friend's.

• A for loop is used in messages.djhtml which uses the Post class to get the owner, timestamp and content of the post
• The messages_view function queries the posts and sorts them by recently posted using timestamp as the primary key and order_by
• Initially, the messages page displays only one post. Each time the More button is clicked, posts are displayed incrementally.
• The More button is linked to the more_post_view function which uses a session counter to increment it by 1
• Once the user has logged out, the number of posts displayed are reset
• The url path is routed as path('postsubmit/', views.post_submit_view,name='post_submit_view')

~Exceptions If the session count is less than the forloop counter, the posts will not be displayed and instead the user will be redirected to the login page

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Objective 10

~Description: Objective 10 gives the user the accessbility to like posts and view the likes count

• All posts initially have a like count of 0
• messages.djhtml contains the substituted variables and id for posts and the like count
• The user can only like a post once after which the like button is disabled
• A variable in the like_view function, postIDReq is assigned to retrieve the POST request of the postID and using the Post and UserInfo class splits at "_" and then added to the likes
• A boolean is used to check if a post has already been liked by the user and disables the button if it has
• The url path is routed as path('like/', views.like_view,name='like_view')

~Exceptions: A HttpResponseNotFound is returned if a POST method is called prematurely without referencing the postID in like_view

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Objective 11

~Description: Objective 11 is a Test Database containing pre-existing users, login credentials, user attributes, user friends, user posts and all the various functionality of the project.

Users and Login Credentials

Usernames	Passwords
Merlin	pf2Yc9xvAS
Dave	FcPYVZMsB6
Edwin	c4FPuPUCqW
Candice	6PFyBSt8V8
Harry	rk4t9YpMxg