Project 2: Building & consuming your own API

Project Submission

1. Host your entire application on Heroku
2. Soft launch of your project is on Heroku by Wednesday 26th October 2016.
3. Submit the links at the Project 2 submission page
4. The deadline for this project is on Friday 28th October 2016, 8am
5. Before the deadline ensure that the master branch contains your latest project code.
6. Before the deadline ensure that your apps are successfully deployed to Heroku

Overview

This second project is your first foray into building a full-stack application. You'll be building a Node app which serves an API and a front-end application which consumes the API.

This is exciting! It sounds like a lot, but you already have all the tools to build them! Get creative in choosing what sort of application you want to build!

You will be working individually for this project, and you'll be designing the app yourself. We hope you'll exercise creativity on this project, sketch some wireframes before you start, and write user stories to define what your users will want to do with the app. Make sure you have time to run these ideas by your instructors to get their feedback before you dive too deep into code! Remember to keep things small and focus on mastering the fundamentals – scope creep/feature creep is the biggest pitfall for any project!

Project 2A: Blog

Develop a blog with the below minimum technical requirements.

Project 2B: Freestyle App

Develop your own personal project with the below minimum technical requirements.

Technical Requirements

Deliverables include:

• Node back-end server
  • Include sign up/log in functionality, with encrypted passwords and an authorization flow
  • Made with Mongoose and Express (validate otherwise)
  • API should be created using at least 3 related models ( more if they make sense )
  • Generate views using templates
    • Project 2A, your models should be:
      • User - someone using your application
      • Post - blog posts
      • Comment - comments on the posts.
    • Project 2B:
      • one user model
      • remaining models - depending on functional idea
  • Include all major CRUD functions in a RESTful API for at least one of those models
• Front-end application
  • Layout and style your front-end with clean & well-formatted CSS
• Overall
  • Craft thoughtful user stories
  • ER and user flow diagrams
  • Deploy your application online so it's publicly accessible

Optional

• Consume your own API with AJAX calls to the back-end server
• Incorporate external APIs
  • Consumed by your front-end application
  • Consumed by your back-end application in the models
  • Feel free to utilize and combine a few external APIs to create a more useful API

Presentation format

• Presentations are 8 mins: 5 mins presentation and 3 mins feedback/Q&A
• Students to present on one project (Either project 2A or 2B)
• The order of the presentation will be random.
• Student before the current presenter to give feedback in the form of one glow comment (One great thing about their project)
• Student after the current presenter to give feedback in the form of one grow comment (A possible improvement to their project)

Things to mention during your presentation:

• Explain what your app is about and demo it
• Talk about your planning process
• Show your code
• Explain how you organized your codes
• Share interesting code solutions
• Talk about any issues you encountered during the project and how you overcame them.

Project Feedback + Evaluation

• Project Workflow: Did you complete the user stories, wireframes, task tracking, and/or ERDs, as specified above? Did you use source control as expected for the phase of the program you’re in (detailed above)?

• Technical Requirements: Did you deliver a project that met all the technical requirements? Given what the class has covered so far, did you build something that was reasonably complex?

• Creativity: Did you add a personal spin or creative element to your project submission? Did you deliver something of value to the end user (not just a login button and an index page)?

• Code Quality: Did you follow code style guidance and best practices covered in class, such as spacing, modularity, and semantic naming? Did you comment your code as your instructors have in class?

• Deployment and Functionality: Is your application deployed and functional at a public URL? Is your application free of errors and incomplete functionality?

• Total: Your instructors will give you a total score on your project between:

This will serve as a helpful overall gauge of whether you met the project goals, but the more important scores are the individual ones above, which can help you identify where to focus your efforts for the next project!

Necessary Deliverables

• Github Repo: A full stack project consisting of: a working API (on your backend) and a front-end that uses your own API, all hosted on Heroku
• A link to your hosted working app in the URL section of your GitHub repo
• A readme.md file with:
  • Explanations of the technologies used
  • A couple paragraphs about the general approach you took
  • Installation instructions for any dependencies
  • Link to your user stories – who are your users, what do they want, and why?
  • Link to your wireframes – sketches of major views / interfaces in your application
  • Link to your diagrams – ER and user flow diagram
  • Descriptions of any unsolved problems or major hurdles your team had to overcome

Suggested Ways to Get Started

• Begin with the end in mind. Know where you want to go by planning with wireframes & user stories, so you don't waste time building things you don't need
• Don’t hesitate to write throwaway code to solve short term problems
• Read the docs for whatever technologies you use. Most of the time, there is a tutorial that you can follow, but not always, and learning to read documentation is crucial to your success as a developer
• Commit early, commit often. Don’t be afraid to break something because you can always go back in time to a previous version.
• User stories define what a specific type of user wants to accomplish with your application. It's tempting to just make them to-do lists for what needs to get done, but if you keep them small & focused on what a user cares about from their perspective, it'll help you know what to build
• Write pseudocode before you write actual code. Thinking through the logic of something helps.

Potential Project Ideas

Cheerups

The world is a depressing place.

Your task is to create an app that will allow people to create and share "cheerups" - happy little quips to brighten other people's' days. Cheerups will be small - limited to 139 characters. Members will be able to promote Cheerups that they like and maybe even boost the reputation of the Cheerupper.

Bookmarket

You will create an application where users can bookmark links they want to keep.

But what if users could trade bookmarks for other bookmarks? Or sell bookmarks for points? Or send bookmarks to your friends. Or something even crazier.

Photo sharing app

Users will be able to register and create albums and photos. Albums and photos will need to be named and described by their owners. Users will be able to view other user's' albums. Maybe users can comment on photos, or either up/down vote them.

Useful Resources

• Heroku (for hosting your back-end)
• Writing Good User Stories (for a few user story tips)
• Presenting Information Architecture (for more insight into wireframing)