IVOverflow

IVOverflow is a secure, production-grade developer Q&A application inspired by Stack Overflow. It was built across three logical delivery stages: authentication and questions, answers, and voting. The result is a full-stack interview assignment that demonstrates clean product iteration, typed API boundaries, server-side data ownership, accessibility, security hardening, and reviewer-friendly developer experience.

Developers can log in with seeded users, ask tagged questions, answer questions, and vote answers up or down. Votes are enforced as one vote per user per answer, answers are sorted by server-computed score, and question/answer bodies support Prism.js syntax highlighting for fenced code snippets.

Architecture & Tech Stack

IVOverflow is structured as a monorepo with clear separation between client/ and server/. This keeps frontend and backend concerns isolated while still allowing shared project-level workflows, documentation, CI, and development scripts.¹

Layer	Stack
Frontend	React, Redux Toolkit, RTK Query, CSS Modules, Prism.js via RichBody
Backend	Node.js, Express, TypeScript, Helmet, CORS hardening
ORM	Prisma
Database	PostgreSQL via Docker Compose
Auth	JWT with 1-hour expiration, fail-fast JWT_SECRET, protected API routes
Testing	Vitest + Supertest backend integration tests

High-Level Flow

React + RTK Query
-> Express REST API + JWT middleware
-> Prisma ORM
-> PostgreSQL

Dev Experience & Quality Controls

• Local pre-commit quality gate with Husky + lint-staged, running ESLint fixes and Prettier on staged files.¹
• GitHub Actions CI validates both packages on every push and PR: server lint/test/build and client lint/build.²
• Backend integration coverage includes authentication, questions, answers, health, and voting behavior, with 33 passing tests.³
• RTK Query cache invalidation keeps the UI synchronized after creating questions, posting answers, and voting.
• Security polish includes Helmet, restricted CORS, Prisma parameterized access, JWT validation, and no hardcoded JWT fallback secret.

Prerequisites

Install these before running the app locally:

• Node.js 18+
• Docker Desktop

Setup & Run Instructions

From the repository root:

npm install

Create a local server environment file if it does not already exist:

cp server/.env.example server/.env

Start PostgreSQL:

docker compose up -d

Prepare the database and seed test users:

cd server && npx prisma migrate dev && npx prisma db seed
cd ..

Boot the full application from the root directory:

npm run dev

The app will be available at:

• Frontend: http://localhost:5173
• Backend API: http://localhost:3001

Hardcoded Testing Credentials

Seeded users are created by server/prisma/seed.ts. Use any of these credentials to log in immediately:

Name	Email	Password
Alice Cohen	alice@ivtech.dev	password123
Bob Levi	bob@ivtech.dev	password123
Carol Mizrahi	carol@ivtech.dev	password123

Feature Summary

Stage 1: Authentication & Questions

• JWT login with hardcoded seeded users
• SHA-512 password hashing per assignment requirements
• Protected routes and authenticated API access
• Ask Question modal available globally inside authenticated routes
• Question list and detail pages

Stage 2: Answers

• Submit answers on the question detail page
• Display answer author and timestamp
• Server-side answer ordering by creation time before voting is introduced

Stage 3: Voting

• Upvote, downvote, flip vote, and cancel same-value vote
• One vote per user per answer enforced at the database level
• Server-computed score and myVote fields returned with answers
• Answers sorted by score DESC, then createdAt ASC
• Accessible voting controls with active states and double-submit protection

Useful Commands

# Root
npm run dev
npm run format:check
# Servercd server
npm run lint
npm test
npm run build
# Clientcd client
npm run lint
npm run build

Notes for Reviewers

• The backend returns consistent JSON envelopes: { data } on success and { error } on failure.
• All protected API calls require Authorization: Bearer <token>.
• GET /getQuestionAnswer is the source of truth for vote score ordering; the frontend intentionally does not re-sort answers.
• Fenced code blocks in question and answer bodies are highlighted with Prism.js, for example:

```typescript
const answer = "Use Prisma and RTK Query";
```

Footnotes

1. See architecture.md for the full architecture, source layout, and local development model. ↩↩²

2. See .github/workflows/ci.yml for the CI pipeline definition. ↩

3. The final backend suite contains 33 passing Vitest/Supertest tests across health, auth, questions, answers, and voting. ↩