DormSpace

A marketplace for college students to buy and sell dorm essentials. Currently supporting MIT, with plans to expand to other universities.

Features

• User Authentication - .edu email verification, JWT sessions, password reset
• Listings - Create, edit, and browse listings with up to 6 images per item
• Real-time Messaging - Server-sent events (SSE) powered chat between buyers and sellers
• AI-Powered Listings - Generate titles and descriptions from item photos using Claude/GPT
• Favorites - Save listings for later
• Search & Filter - Find items by keyword, category, price, and sort order

Tech Stack

Frontend

• React 18 with Vite
• Tailwind CSS for styling
• React Router for navigation

Backend

• Express.js (Node.js)
• PostgreSQL database
• JWT authentication
• Nodemailer for transactional emails

ML Service

• FastAPI (Python)
• Anthropic Claude / OpenAI for AI-generated listing content
• LangGraph for orchestration

Infrastructure

• AWS S3 for image storage (presigned URLs)
• Supabase for hosted PostgreSQL
• Firebase Hosting for frontend
• Railway for backend and ML service

Project Structure

├── frontend/          # React + Vite application
├── backend/           # Express API server
├── ml-service/        # FastAPI AI service
└── .github/workflows/ # CI/CD for Firebase deployment

Local Development

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18+
• Python 3.10+
• PostgreSQL 14+

Backend

cd backend
npm install
cp .env.example .env  # Configure environment variables
node index.js

Frontend

cd frontend
npm install
npm run dev

ML Service

cd ml-service
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
uvicorn main:app --reload --port 8000

Environment Variables

See each service directory for required environment variables:

• backend/.env - Database URL, JWT secret, AWS credentials, email config
• frontend/.env - API base URL
• ml-service/.env - AI provider keys, eBay API credentials

License

MIT