Setting up local development

To get started with local development, you will first need to add files to the frontend and backend directories for environment variables.

• Notes that these files are and should not be committed to the repository because they contain sensitive API keys and other secret information. You can find these secrets in our shared Google drive.

In the /frontend directory, add a file named .env.

• To use your local backend for frontend API calls, ensure that REACT_APP_BACKEND_URL is set to 'http://localhost:5000'

In the /backend directory, add a file name config.env.

• For the backdoor login to function properly, set BASE_URL to http://localhost:3000
• Ensure that ATLAS_URI has the word dev after the slash and before the question mark
• Note BACKDOOR_PASSWORD as you will need this for backdoor authentication

Now that your environment variables are setup, we can begin to develop locally.

1. Open a terminal (you can use the integrated terminal in your IDE) and start the backend server

cd backend && node index.js

1. Open another terminal window (keeping the backend server running) and start the frontend website

cd frontend && npm start

If you don’t want the website to automatically open, you can use this command instead:

cd frontend && export BROWSER=none && npm start

1. Navigate to http://localhost:3000/login/backdoor. Enter your JHED and the backdoor password found in backend/config.env

You are now authenticated for local development.
Code changes made to frontend code will be updated automatically, but changing an environment variable will require you to restart npm start.
If you are testing admin endpoints or trying to access the admin page, you will need to change your isAdmin field in the dev database via MongoDB.