Video Streaming Platform (Backend)

A Node.js + MongoDB backend for a YouTube-like video streaming platform.
This backend provides authentication, video uploads, subscriptions, and token-based session management.

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Tech Stack

• Runtime: Node.js, Express.js
• Database: MongoDB + Mongoose ODM
• Authentication: JWT (Access & Refresh Tokens), Cookies
• File Handling: Multer for file uploads
• Debugging: Custom middleware + error handling
• Testing API: Postman

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Features

• User Management

  • User registration & login with JWT
  • Access & refresh token handling
  • Secure cookie-based sessions
  • Password hashing & Mongoose hooks

• Video Management

  • Upload videos with Multer
  • Store metadata in MongoDB
  • Aggregation pipelines for analytics
  • Sub-pipelines for subscriptions and recommendations

• Subscriptions

  • Subscription schema & controllers
  • Aggregated subscriber counts
  • Fetch videos from subscribed channels

• API Structure

  • RESTful routes (HTTP methods: GET, POST, PUT, DELETE)
  • Controllers for user, video, and subscription logic
  • Middleware for authentication, error handling, and debugging
  • Custom API response format for consistency

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Project Structure

src/
┣ controllers/ # Route handlers (User, Video, Subscription)
┣ models/ # MongoDB models with Mongoose
┣ middleware/ # Auth, error handling, debugging
┣ routes/ # Express routers
┣ utils/ # Custom helpers (API response, JWT, etc.)
┗ server.js # App entry point

Authentication Flow

• Register/Login → JWT generated
• Access Token: short-lived, stored in cookies
• Refresh Token: long-lived, used to regenerate access token
• Middleware validates tokens and attaches user info to req.user

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Data Models

• User Model
  • Schema with hooks (password hashing, token generation)
• Video Model
  • Video metadata, upload path, likes/dislikes
• Subscription Model
  • Linking subscribers with creators
• Tokens
  • Access & refresh tokens handled with cookies

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API Endpoints & Examples

Auth

Register

POST /api/auth/register

// Request
{
  "username": "sehrish",
  "email": "sehrish@example.com",
  "password": "mypassword123"
}

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "message": "User registered successfully",
  "data": {
    "id": "64c5b7...",
    "username": "sehrish",
    "email": "sehrish@example.com"
  }
}

Login

• POST /api/auth/login

// Request
{
  "email": "sehrish@example.com",
  "password": "mypassword123"
}

// Response (cookies set with tokens)
{
  "success": true,
  "message": "Login successful",
  "data": {
    "accessToken": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI...",
    "refreshToken": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI..."
  }
}

Videos

• POST /api/videos/upload
• (Form-Data: file → video file, title, description)

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "message": "Video uploaded successfully",
  "data": {
    "id": "64c5c1...",
    "title": "My Travel Vlog",
    "description": "Trip to Hunza",
    "fileUrl": "/uploads/1693234-video.mp4",
    "uploadedBy": "64c5b7..."
  }
}

Get Video by ID

• GET /api/videos/:id

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "data": {
    "id": "64c5c1...",
    "title": "My Travel Vlog",
    "views": 102,
    "likes": 10,
    "dislikes": 1,
    "uploadedBy": {
      "id": "64c5b7...",
      "username": "sehrish"
    }
  }
}

Subscriptions

• Subscribe to a User
• POST /api/subscriptions/:channelId

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "message": "Subscribed successfully",
  "data": {
    "subscriberId": "64c5b7...",
    "channelId": "64c5b8..."
  }
}

Get Subscribed Videos

• GET /api/subscriptions/videos

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "data": [
    {
      "title": "Cooking Show",
      "channel": "Foodie123",
      "views": 1500
    },
    {
      "title": "Coding Tutorial",
      "channel": "DevWorld",
      "views": 3200
    }
  ]
}

Token Refresh

• POST /api/auth/refresh-token

// Request
{
  "refreshToken": "eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI..."
}

// Response
{
  "success": true,
  "data": {
    "accessToken": "new-access-token..."
  }
}

API Testing

Used Postman collections for:

• Register/Login
• Upload video
• Subscribe/Unsubscribe
• Token refresh
• Error scenarios

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Error Handling

• Centralized error middleware
• Custom API response format
• Debugging logs for development

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Installation

# Clone repo
git clone https://github.com/SehrishHussain/misterymessage.git
cd misterymessage

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Create .env file
MONGO_URI=your_mongo_connection
JWT_SECRET=your_secret
PORT=5000

# Start server
npm run dev

Future Improvements

• Add video streaming with chunks
• Implement comments & likes
• Improve subscription recommendations
• Deploy on cloud (Heroku, Render, etc.)