📋 JobTracker — Full-Stack Job Application Tracker

A complete, production-ready job application tracking system with user and admin roles, built with React, Node.js, Express, and MongoDB.

---

✨ Features

User Features

• 📊 Dashboard — Visual stats (total, interviews, offers, rejected) with bar & pie charts
• 💼 Applications CRUD — Add, edit, delete job applications with full details
• 🔍 Search & Filter — Search by title/company/notes, filter by status, sort by multiple fields
• 📄 Pagination — Efficient paginated results
• 🔔 Email Notifications — Mocked email on status change (real SMTP ready)
• 🤖 AI Notes Suggestions — OpenAI-powered improvements for application notes
• 📋 Activity Log — Full history of all user actions
• 👤 Profile Management — Update name, email, and password

Admin Features

• ⚡ Admin Dashboard — Platform-wide analytics and user growth charts
• 👥 User Management — View, suspend, activate, and delete users
• 🗂️ All Applications — View and filter every application in the system
• 📈 Analytics — Status breakdowns, monthly growth, key metrics

Tech Highlights

• 🔐 JWT authentication with role-based route protection
• 🔒 Password hashing with bcrypt (12 rounds)
• ⚡ Rate limiting (100 req/15 min per IP)
• 📱 Fully responsive — mobile + desktop
• 🌙 Dark theme with clean modern UI

---

🚀 Quick Start

Prerequisites

• Node.js v18+
• MongoDB (local or Atlas)
• npm or yarn

---

1. Clone the Repository

git clone <your-repo-url>
cd job-tracker

---

2. Backend Setup

cd backend
npm install

Create your .env file:

cp .env.example .env

Edit .env with your values:

PORT=5000
NODE_ENV=development
MONGODB_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017/job-tracker
JWT_SECRET=your_super_secret_key_change_this
JWT_EXPIRES_IN=7d
EMAIL_HOST=smtp.gmail.com
EMAIL_PORT=587
EMAIL_USER=your_email@gmail.com
EMAIL_PASS=your_app_password
OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-your-openai-key   # Optional — for AI notes feature
FRONTEND_URL=http://localhost:5173

Seed sample data (optional but recommended):

npm run seed

This creates:

Role	Email	Password
Admin	admin@jobtracker.com	Admin123!
User	alex@example.com	password123
User	sarah@example.com	password123

Start the backend:

npm run dev    # Development with nodemon
npm start      # Production

Backend runs at: http://localhost:5000

---

3. Frontend Setup

cd ../frontend
npm install
npm run dev

Frontend runs at: http://localhost:5173

The Vite dev server proxies /api requests to localhost:5000 automatically.

---

📁 Project Structure

job-tracker/
├── backend/
│   ├── controllers/
│   │   ├── authController.js      # Signup, login, getMe
│   │   ├── jobController.js       # CRUD, stats, AI suggest
│   │   ├── userController.js      # Profile, password
│   │   └── adminController.js     # Admin analytics, user mgmt
│   ├── middleware/
│   │   ├── auth.js                # JWT protect + adminOnly
│   │   └── errorHandler.js        # Global error handling
│   ├── models/
│   │   ├── User.js                # User schema + bcrypt hooks
│   │   ├── Job.js                 # Job application schema
│   │   └── ActivityLog.js         # Audit trail (90-day TTL)
│   ├── routes/
│   │   ├── authRoutes.js
│   │   ├── jobRoutes.js
│   │   ├── userRoutes.js
│   │   └── adminRoutes.js
│   ├── utils/
│   │   ├── emailService.js        # Nodemailer email notifications
│   │   └── seedData.js            # Development seed script
│   ├── .env.example
│   ├── package.json
│   └── server.js
│
├── frontend/
│   ├── src/
│   │   ├── components/
│   │   │   ├── common/
│   │   │   │   ├── LoadingScreen.jsx  # Loading screen + Spinner
│   │   │   │   ├── Pagination.jsx     # Reusable pagination
│   │   │   │   └── StatusBadge.jsx    # Job status badges
│   │   │   ├── jobs/
│   │   │   │   └── JobModal.jsx       # Add/edit job modal + AI
│   │   │   └── layout/
│   │   │       ├── Layout.jsx         # App shell
│   │   │       └── Sidebar.jsx        # Navigation sidebar
│   │   ├── context/
│   │   │   └── AuthContext.jsx        # Global auth state
│   │   ├── pages/
│   │   │   ├── Login.jsx
│   │   │   ├── Register.jsx
│   │   │   ├── Dashboard.jsx          # Stats + charts
│   │   │   ├── Jobs.jsx               # Application list + CRUD
│   │   │   ├── Profile.jsx            # Profile + password
│   │   │   ├── ActivityLog.jsx        # User activity history
│   │   │   └── admin/
│   │   │       ├── AdminDashboard.jsx
│   │   │       ├── AdminUsers.jsx
│   │   │       └── AdminJobs.jsx
│   │   ├── services/
│   │   │   └── api.js                 # Axios + all API calls
│   │   ├── App.jsx                    # Router + route guards
│   │   └── index.css                  # Tailwind + custom styles
│   ├── package.json
│   ├── vite.config.js
│   └── tailwind.config.js
│
└── README.md

---

📘 API Documentation

Base URL: http://localhost:5000/api

All protected routes require: Authorization: Bearer <token>

---

🔐 Auth

Method	Endpoint	Auth	Description
POST	/auth/signup	❌	Register new user
POST	/auth/login	❌	Login, get JWT
GET	/auth/me	✅	Get current user

POST /auth/signup

{ "name": "Alex Johnson", "email": "alex@example.com", "password": "password123" }

Response: { token, user: { _id, name, email, role, status } }

POST /auth/login

{ "email": "alex@example.com", "password": "password123" }

Response: { token, user: { _id, name, email, role, status, lastLogin } }

---

💼 Jobs

Method	Endpoint	Auth	Description
GET	/jobs	✅	List user's jobs (paginated)
GET	/jobs/stats	✅	Dashboard statistics
GET	/jobs/activity	✅	User activity log
GET	/jobs/:id	✅	Get single job
POST	/jobs	✅	Create job
PUT	/jobs/:id	✅	Update job
DELETE	/jobs/:id	✅	Delete job
POST	/jobs/:id/ai-suggest	✅	AI notes suggestion

GET /jobs — Query params:

?page=1&limit=10&status=Applied&search=stripe&sortBy=createdAt&sortOrder=desc

POST /jobs — Body:

{
  "jobTitle": "Senior Engineer",
  "company": "Stripe",
  "status": "Applied",
  "notes": "Applied via referral",
  "dateApplied": "2024-08-15",
  "location": "Remote",
  "salary": "$150k–$180k",
  "jobUrl": "https://stripe.com/jobs/123"
}

---

👤 Users

Method	Endpoint	Auth	Description
GET	/users/profile	✅	Get profile
PUT	/users/profile	✅	Update name/email
PUT	/users/change-password	✅	Change password
GET	/users/activity	✅	Activity log

---

⚡ Admin (Admin role required)

Method	Endpoint	Auth	Description
GET	/admin/stats	✅ Admin	Platform analytics
GET	/admin/users	✅ Admin	All users (paginated)
GET	/admin/users/:id	✅ Admin	User detail + jobs
PATCH	/admin/users/:id/status	✅ Admin	Suspend/activate user
DELETE	/admin/users/:id	✅ Admin	Delete user + data
GET	/admin/jobs	✅ Admin	All jobs (paginated)
GET	/admin/activity	✅ Admin	System activity log

---

🔧 Environment Variables

Variable	Required	Description
MONGODB_URI	✅	MongoDB connection string
JWT_SECRET	✅	Secret for JWT signing (keep secure!)
JWT_EXPIRES_IN	❌	Token expiry (default: 7d)
PORT	❌	Server port (default: 5000)
NODE_ENV	❌	development or production
FRONTEND_URL	❌	CORS allowed origin
EMAIL_HOST	❌	SMTP host
EMAIL_PORT	❌	SMTP port
EMAIL_USER	❌	SMTP email address
EMAIL_PASS	❌	SMTP password or app password
OPENAI_API_KEY	❌	For AI notes suggestions

---

🚢 Deployment

Backend (Railway / Render / Fly.io)

1. Set all environment variables in the platform dashboard
2. Set NODE_ENV=production
3. Set FRONTEND_URL=https://your-frontend.vercel.app
4. Deploy from your Git repo

Frontend (Vercel / Netlify)

1. Update vite.config.js proxy OR set VITE_API_URL env var
2. In src/services/api.js, change baseURL to your backend URL:

   baseURL: import.meta.env.VITE_API_URL || '/api'

3. Deploy frontend to Vercel/Netlify

MongoDB Atlas

1. Create a free cluster at mongodb.com/atlas
2. Whitelist your server's IP
3. Copy the connection string to MONGODB_URI

---

🤖 AI Feature Setup

1. Get an API key from platform.openai.com
2. Add OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-... to your .env
3. In the Jobs page → Edit a job → click 🤖 AI Suggest

The AI analyzes the job title, company, and current notes, then suggests improvements including interview prep, follow-up points, and research areas.

---

🧪 Sample Test Data

After running npm run seed in the backend:

• Admin account: Full admin dashboard access
• Alex's account: 10 pre-populated job applications across all statuses, spanning 6 months of data for realistic chart visualization
• Sarah's account: 2 applications for additional variety

---

📝 License

MIT — free to use, modify, and distribute.