መሠረተ ሃይማኖት ሰንበት ትምህርት ቤት — Web App

Web app for Ta'eka Negest Be'ata Le Mariam Gedam, Meserete Haimanot Sunday School (Addis Ababa). Amharic-first public site, online registration, educational material archive, and an admin CMS.

Stack

• Frontend: Next.js 16 (App Router) + TypeScript + Tailwind v4, in frontend/
• Backend: Prisma schema + repositories + auth helpers, as a local workspace package @meserete/backend, in backend/
• Database: PostgreSQL (local via Docker, or Neon for cloud)
• Auth: Auth.js (NextAuth v5), credentials-based, admin/teacher roles only
• File uploads (post-launch admin uploads): Cloudinary

Setup — local development

1. Install dependencies (installs both workspaces from the repo root):

   npm install
   

2. Start local Postgres:

   docker compose up -d
   

3. Copy the env file (already done if .env exists — it defaults to the local Docker connection string):

   cp .env.example .env
   

   Generate a real NEXTAUTH_SECRET with openssl rand -base64 32 and paste it in. Also set CLOUDINARY_URL from your Cloudinary dashboard's "API Environment variable" (needed for the admin Gallery/Materials upload forms to work — public pages work fine without it).

4. Run the first migration and seed sample content:

   npm run db:migrate
   npm run db:seed
   

   This creates one admin login: admin@meseretehaimanot.org / ChangeMe123! — change this password or create a new admin via:

   npm run create-admin -- someone@example.com "Full Name" "a-strong-password" ADMIN
   

5. Start the dev server:

   npm run dev
   

   Visit http://localhost:3000.

6. Admin CMS: http://localhost:3000/admin/login

Using Neon instead of local Docker

Create a free project at neon.tech, copy its connection string, and replace DATABASE_URL in .env with it (comment out the local Docker line). Then run steps 4–5 again against that database.

Useful commands

• npm run db:studio — opens Prisma Studio (browse/edit DB rows directly)
• npm run build — production build (also type-checks everything)

Deploying to Vercel

1. Import the repo into Vercel, set Root Directory to frontend.
2. Add environment variables in the Vercel project settings: DATABASE_URL (point at Neon), NEXTAUTH_URL (your production URL), NEXTAUTH_SECRET, CLOUDINARY_URL (from your Cloudinary dashboard), NEXT_PUBLIC_SITE_URL.
3. Before (or right after) a deploy that changes the Prisma schema, run migrations against the production database from your machine:

   DATABASE_URL="<neon-connection-string>" npx prisma migrate deploy --schema=backend/prisma/schema.prisma
   

   Migrations are not run automatically as part of the Vercel build.

What's built vs. scaffolded

Fully built: public site (home, history, news, events, gallery, articles, mezmur/hymn archive), online registration, educational material archive with download, admin CMS (login, dashboard, CRUD for news/events/gallery/materials/mezmur/articles, registrations review, read-only members list).

Scaffolded only (data model + a minimal page, not a full feature): discussion forum (/forum — no reply UI yet), donations (/donate — records interest only, no payment gateway wired).

Known follow-ups

• The /history page content was transcribed by reading photographed pages of a printed history booklet (Pictures/history_pic/, not included in the repo). A few words in that transcription are uncertain due to the angle/blur of the source photos — worth a native-speaker proofread pass against the original booklet before treating it as fully authoritative.
• The curated photo set in frontend/public/images/ is a subset (~35 of ~160) of the original Pictures/ folder; more can be added later through the admin Gallery upload feature.