Game Player Nick Finder

🌏 Project Overview

Welcome to the "Game Player Nick Finder" - a unique platform to reconnect with your old online gaming friends deployed at gpnf.zentala.io.

🎮 Key Features

• Search by Nicknames: Easily find your old gaming friends using their nicknames.
• User Registration: Join the community and let others find you.
• Character Profiles: Create detailed profiles for your gaming characters with descriptions and timelines.
• Messaging System: Communicate directly with your old friends on the platform.
• Email Notifications: Stay updated on new friend requests and messages.

🛠 Technical Stack Overview

Category	Technology
Front-end
Back-end
Environment
DBs
Marketing
IDE

Code quality status

🤝 Join the Community!

👾 ...of Old Forgotten Gaming Friends

Join the "Game Player Nick Finder" platform by registering at gpnf.zentala.io. Fill out your gaming history, the more players join, the greater the chances of reconnecting with old gaming friends. Let's build a thriving community together!

🖥️ ...of App Developers Community

Contribute to the "Game Player Nick Finder" project by:

• Starring & Watching this repo to stay updated with the latest features and releases.
• Picking tasks in our GitHub Project.
• Sharing your suggestions and reporting bugs in the Issues section.

Your input helps us evolve and improve the platform for the benefit of all gamers.

Installation and Running the Application Locally

Before you proceed, ensure that your system has the following installed:

• Python (version 3.6 or newer)
• pip (Python package management tool) [sudo apt install python3-pip]
• pipenv (Python packaging tool for virtual environments) [pip install pipenv]

Step 1: Clone the Repository

Clone the repository to your local computer using the following git command:

git clone https://github.com/zentala/game_player_nick_finder
cd game_player_nick_finder

Step 2: Setup pipenv

To set up the pipenv environment and install dependencies, run the following command:

pipenv install

This will create a Pipfile and Pipfile.lock if they don't exist and install all required dependencies.

Step 3: Activate pipenv Environment

To activate the pipenv environment, use:

pipenv shell

Step 4: Configure the Database

The application uses SQLite as the default database, so there is no need to set up an additional database. You can simply perform the database migration:

python manage.py migrate

Step 5: Create admin user

python manage.py createsuperuser

Step 6: Apply fixtures

python manage.py loaddata app/fixtures/categories_fixtures.json
python manage.py loaddata app/fixtures/games_fixtures.json

Step 7: .env Configuration

Before using certain features, such as email notifications, you need to configure the environment variables. First, make a copy of the .env.example file and rename it to .env. Then, update the values with the correct configurations for your environment.

Step 8: Run the Server

To start the Django development server, run the following command:

python manage.py runserver

The application should now be accessible at http://localhost:8000/

Intallation and Deamonizing Application on Server

1. Follow all steps for local installation and startup. Verify that the application is running at http://localhost:8000/.
2. Copy ecosystem.config.js.manage or ecosystem.config.js.wsgi (recommended) into ecosystem.config.js and adjust paths in the configuration file.
3. Daemonize the server using the command pm2 start ecosystem.config.js. Ensure you have PM2 installed. If not, you can install it using the command npm install pm2 -g.
4. Configure the nginx server to handle requests under a specific domain and add an SSL Certificate. You can use Let's Encrypt for a free SSL certificate. Keep in mind that nginx configuration may vary depending on your operating system and specific requirements.

Options in manage.py

manage.py is a script file in Django that allows you to manage the application and execute various commands. Here are several useful options provided by manage.py:

flush

The flush command removes all data from the database while leaving the tables intact. This is useful during testing when you want to clear the database and start tests from a clean state.

Example usage:

python manage.py flush

migrate

The migrate command executes database migrations. Migrations are a way to keep the database structure in sync with the data model in the application. It allows creating, modifying, and deleting tables and fields in the database based on changes in the models.

Example usage:

python manage.py migrate

makemigrations

The makemigrations command is used to generate new migration files based on changes in the application's models. After making changes to the models, use this command to prepare new migrations before applying them with migrate.

Example usage:

python manage.py makemigrations

shell

The shell command runs an interactive Python console with all Django models loaded. This allows for interactive data analysis and experimentation with database operations.

Example usage:

python manage.py shell

createsuperuser

The createsuperuser command allows you to create a new superuser for the application. The superuser can log in to the Django admin panel and manage the application data.

Example usage:

python manage.py createsuperuser

Other Commands

In addition to the ones mentioned above, there are many other commands available in manage.py that you can use for various purposes, such as managing users, generating reports, running tests, etc. To see a full list of commands and their descriptions, you can use the help command:

python manage.py help

Using this, you can get insights into the various options available in manage.py and how to use them to manage your Django application.