Chat Application

A real-time chat application with user authentication, private chatrooms, message history, and dark/light mode toggle.

Features

• User authentication (Email/Password & Google)
• Real-time messaging (Socket.io)
• Private chatrooms (direct messages)
• Message history (Firestore)
• Active users sidebar
• Dark mode / Light mode toggle (Material-UI)

Tech Stack

• React (frontend)
• Material-UI (UI components)
• Firebase (Authentication, Firestore)
• Node.js + Express + Socket.io (backend)

Setup

1. Clone the repository

git clone <your-repo-url>
cd Chat_Application

2. Frontend Setup

cd frontend
npm install

• Add your Firebase config to src/firebase.js.

3. Backend Setup

cd ../backend
npm install

4. Start Development Servers

• Frontend:

  cd frontend
  npm start

• Backend:

  cd backend
  node index.js

Deployment

Frontend (Firebase Hosting)

1. Build the app:

   npm run build

2. Install Firebase CLI:

   npm install -g firebase-tools

3. Login and initialize:

   firebase login
   firebase init

   • Choose Hosting, set build as the public directory.
4. Deploy:

   firebase deploy

Backend (Render/Railway/Heroku)

• Push your backend to GitHub.
• Create a new web service on your chosen platform.
• Set the start command to node index.js.
• Update your frontend to use the deployed backend URL for Socket.io.

Firestore Rules (Production)

service cloud.firestore {
  match /databases/{database}/documents {
    match /private_chats/{chatId}/messages/{messageId} {
      allow read, write: if request.auth != null;
    }
  }
}

License

MIT