Lore

An online video directory for entrepreneurs — discover real founder journeys, honest failures, and what actually works.

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Screenshots

Screenshots coming after deployment

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Features

• Authentication — Email/password with verification + Google OAuth via Socialite
• Role-based access — Admin, Creator, and Viewer roles with middleware-gated routes
• Pinterest-style masonry grid — Editorial video browsing inspired by Pinterest
• Video detail pages — YouTube embeds with session-tracked view counts and related videos
• Full-text search — Search by title/description with category and tag filters
• Entrepreneur profiles — Public profiles with total view stats and video grids
• Bookmarks / Watchlist — Save videos to a personal watchlist on the dashboard
• Admin CMS — Dashboard with stats, video management (publish/feature/delete), user management
• Marketing landing page — Startup-grade welcome page with live stats and category explorer
• Optional Google OAuth — The Google sign-in CTA appears only when OAuth credentials are configured
• Resilient empty states — Public pages degrade gracefully before the catalog is seeded

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Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Framework	Laravel 12
Runtime	PHP 8.4+
Frontend	Blade Templates + Tailwind CSS
Fonts	Playfair Display + DM Sans + JetBrains Mono
Auth	Laravel Breeze + Google OAuth (Socialite)
Database	PostgreSQL (Render/Neon production) / SQLite or Postgres locally
Build	Vite 7
Deploy	Render + Neon Postgres

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Local Setup

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/shash-hq/lore.git
cd lore

# Install PHP dependencies
composer install

# Install JS dependencies
npm install

# Set up environment
cp .env.example .env
php artisan key:generate

# For a quick local setup, switch these .env values:
# APP_ENV=local
# APP_DEBUG=true
# APP_URL=http://127.0.0.1:8000
# DB_CONNECTION=sqlite
# DB_DATABASE=/absolute/path/to/database/database.sqlite
# SESSION_SECURE_COOKIE=false

# Run migrations and seed demo data
php artisan migrate --seed

# Start the development servers
npm run dev        # Terminal 1 — Vite asset compiler
php artisan serve  # Terminal 2 — Laravel server

Visit http://127.0.0.1:8000

Demo credentials:

• Admin: admin@lore.com / password

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Free Deployment on Render + Neon

This repository is set up for a true $0 demo deployment:

1. Create a free Neon Postgres project and copy the connection details.
2. Create a new Render web service from this repo.
3. Set the following Render environment variables:
   • APP_NAME=Lore
   • APP_ENV=production
   • APP_DEBUG=false
   • APP_URL=https://your-service.onrender.com
   • APP_KEY= from php artisan key:generate --show
   • DB_CONNECTION=pgsql
   • DB_HOST, DB_PORT, DB_DATABASE, DB_USERNAME, DB_PASSWORD
   • DB_SSLMODE=require
   • QUEUE_CONNECTION=sync
   • SESSION_DRIVER=database
   • CACHE_STORE=database
4. Leave MAIL_MAILER=log for the first demo deploy unless you add a real mail provider.
5. Run php artisan migrate --force --seed after the first successful deploy.
6. If you want Google OAuth, also set:
   • GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID
   • GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET
   • GOOGLE_REDIRECT=https://your-service.onrender.com/auth/google/callback

Important notes:

• Render free services can cold-start, so the first request may be slower.
• Do not use SQLite in production on Render free web services because the filesystem is ephemeral.
• This deploy path does not require a separate queue worker because the app defaults to QUEUE_CONNECTION=sync.

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Project Structure

app/
├── Http/Controllers/
│   ├── AdminController       # Admin stats dashboard
│   ├── AdminVideoController  # Admin CRUD, publish/feature toggles
│   ├── HomeController        # Homepage + category filtering + pagination
│   ├── VideoController       # Video detail + session-based view tracking
│   ├── SearchController      # Full-text search + tag/category filters
│   ├── EntrepreneurController
│   ├── BookmarkController
│   ├── DashboardController
│   └── SocialiteController   # Optional Google OAuth
├── Models/
│   ├── User.php        # Roles + email verification
│   ├── Video.php       # Slug generation, YouTube normalization, featured guard
│   ├── Category.php
│   └── Tag.php
resources/views/
├── layouts/               # app.blade.php, admin.blade.php
├── admin/                 # Admin dashboard + video create/edit/index
├── videos/                # Video detail page
├── entrepreneurs/         # Creator profile pages
├── home.blade.php         # Masonry homepage with featured fallback
├── search.blade.php       # Search results + empty states
├── dashboard.blade.php    # User watchlist + recommendations
└── welcome.blade.php      # Marketing landing page

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Built By

Shashank Ranjan — B.Tech (CSE), Minor in Full-Stack Development

GitHub · LinkedIn

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Course Context

Built as the final project for MVC Programming (PHP Laravel) — INT221, demonstrating full-stack MVC architecture, authentication systems, role-based access control, and production deployment.