InstiForum

InstiForum is a web application designed to facilitate discussions and information sharing within an institute community. The idea behind Insti Forum came from a very simple observation — despite having an IIT Bombay subreddit, we realized that there’s no dedicated platform where students and members of the campus community can engage in meaningful discussions on a variety of topics. The subreddit is limited to just one community, and not everyone prefers using Reddit.

So, we decided to build our very own social discussion platform, tailored specifically for IIT Bombay — something that feels like a mix of a social media platform and a forum, designed to make campus conversations more open, organized, and accessible.

This README provides an overview of the project, setup instructions, and a detailed explanation of the code structure.

Features

• User authentication (login/signup) using ITC SSO
• Create, view, and reply to discussion threads
• Search and filter discussions

Technologies Used

• Frontend: React, Tailwind CSS
• Backend: Next.js
• Database: Supabase
• Authentication: ITC SSO

Existing Schemas

(Create Them As it is in supabase project tables- also toggle RLS policies off if facing issues while fetching)

users

Column Name	Data Type
id (primary)	UUID
name	VARCHAR
roll	VARCHAR
degree	text
department	text
role	text
created_at	timestamp with time zone

posts

Column Name	Data Type
id (primary)	bigint
created_at	timestamp with time zone
user_id	uuid
community_id	bigint
title	text
content	text
image_url	text
upvotes	bigint
downvotes	bigint
flair	text

comments

Column Name	Data Type
id	bigint
created_at	timestamp with time zone
post_id	bigint
parent_id	bigint
content	text
upvotes	bigint
downvotes	bigint
user_id	uuid

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Javascript
• React.js
• Supabase
• Next.js

Installation

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/yourusername/instiforum.git
   cd Hello-FOSS-25_Instiforum

2. Install dependencies:

   npm install

3. Supabase Setup (Online)

   1. Go to Supabase Dashboard and create a new project.

   2. In your project, open Settings → API and copy:

      • Project URL
      • Anon public key

   3. In your project root, create a .env file and add the following lines keeping same variables names:

      NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_URL=[yourURL]
      NEXT_PUBLIC_SUPABASE_ANON_KEY=[YourKEY]
      NEXT_PUBLIC_IITSSO_ID=[YourKey] # not necessary
      

4. Start the development servers:

   npm run dev

Contributing

1. Fork the repository
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b feature/fooBar)
3. Commit your changes
4. Push to the branch
5. Open a pull request

Contact

For questions or feedback, open an issue or contact the maintainer.