UsefulWebApps

UsefulWebApps is an ASP.NET Core MVC application with a MySQL database backend.

• User authentication is handled via ASP.NET Core Identity with Entity Framework Core for database access.
• Other data objects are mapped using Dapper.
• The app implements the Repository and Unit of Work pattern to separate data access logic from controllers and business logic.

The application is hosted on an Ubuntu 24.04 server behind an Nginx reverse proxy. The deployment is self-contained, so no .NET runtime installation is required on the server. Useful setup documentation here and here.

Purpose

The goal of UsefulWebApps is to provide an open-source, self-hosted family organizer application. Current functionality includes:

• Recipes management
• Lists
• Weather
• User-customized home pages

Future plans include:

• Family calendar
• Family chat
• Website aggregator
• Optional email server for enhanced login and notifications

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Local Development Setup

1. Install MySQL Community Server (v8.0.37 used in development).
2. Clone the repository and build the project with Visual Studio.
3. Database seeding: The plan is to provide a development MySQL dump with dummy users and data. You can log in using the provided admin password, then update it before backing up the database and hosting it on your own server.
4. Run the application locally to test functionality.

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Backup and Restore on Windows

1. Open Command Prompt (not PowerShell) in MySql Server bin

cd C:\Program Files\MySQL\MySQL Server 8.0\bin

2. Backup

mysqldump -u root -p usefulwebapps > C:\MySQLBackup\usefulwebapps_YYYY_MM_DD.sql

3. Restore

mysql -u root -p usefulwebapps < C:\MySQLBackup\usefulwebapps_YYYY_MM_DD.sql

Deploying to Ubuntu Server

1. Login to the Ubuntu server and shut down the Kestrel service

cd /etc/systemd/system
sudo systemctl stop kestrel-usefulwebapps.service

2. Transfer publish files from Windows using rsync via Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). Open Ubuntu terminal in publish root folder then run the below rsync command.

rsync -av * user@hostIP:/var/www/thedotnetwizard.com/html

3. Restart the service

sudo systemctl start kestrel-usefulwebapps.service

Optionally, instead of restarting the service. Reboot the server after updates; the service will restart on boot.

Running the App on Ubuntu

cd /var/www/thedotnetwizard.com/html
./UsefulWebApps

Backup and Restore on Ubuntu

1. Navigate to folder with backups
2. Backup

sudo mysqldump usefulwebapps > usefulwebapps_YYYY_MM_DD.sql

3. Restore

sudo mysql usefulwebapps < usefulwebapps_YYYY_MM_DD.sql

Transfer Database or Images from Ubuntu to Windows

1. Open WSL / Ubuntu terminal on Windows
2. Transfer database dump

rsync -av user@hostIp:/home/beefcake/UseFulWebAppsSqlDumps/usefulwebapps_YYYY_MM_DD.sql /mnt/c/Users/arogala/Documents/SqlDumpFromServer

3. Sync images from server to local development folder

rsync -av user@hostIp:/var/www/thedotnetwizard.com/html/wwwroot/images/ /mnt/c/Users/arogala/Documents/GitHub/UsefulWebApps/UsefulWebApps/wwwroot/images/

🪪 License

UsefulWebApps is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0).

You are free to use, modify, and distribute this software under the terms of the AGPL. If you modify and publicly distribute the software — including via a hosted service — you must make your source code available under the same license.

License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0)