Commune

An open source community platform (profiles, posts, comments, likes, follows) built on the MERN stack with TypeScript.

Stack

Layer	Tech
Web	React 18, Vite, TypeScript, React Router, TanStack Query
API	Node 20, Express, TypeScript, Mongoose, Zod, JWT
Shared	Zod schemas + inferred types used by both web and API
Tooling	npm workspaces, Prettier, Vitest, Docker, GitHub CI

Structure

commune/
├── apps/
│   ├── web/            React frontend
│   └── api/            Express + MongoDB backend
├── packages/
│   └── shared/         Shared validation schemas and types
├── docs/               Architecture and API notes
├── .github/workflows/  CI
├── docker-compose.yml  MongoDB + API
└── .env.example

Getting started

cp .env.example .env
docker compose up -d mongo      # or point MONGODB_URI at your own MongoDB
npm install
npm run dev                     # API on :4000, web on :5173

Deploying

A free production setup (Vercel + Render + MongoDB Atlas + Cloudinary) is described step by step in docs/DEPLOYMENT.md.

Becoming an admin

Admins review reported posts at /admin. There is no signup rule or API for this, so nobody can claim the role by registering first. Register your account in the app, then run:

npm run make-admin -w @commune/api -- you@example.com

Log out and back in, and an Admin link appears in the header.

Scripts

• npm run dev runs API and web together
• npm run typecheck type-checks every workspace
• npm test runs API tests
• npm run build builds shared, API and web

Roadmap

• Auth (register, login, refresh, logout)
• Posts, comments, likes
• Follows and a "Following" feed
• User profiles with editable bios
• Notifications (likes, comments, new followers) with unread badge
• Image uploads (post images and profile photos)
• Real-time notifications (WebSockets / SSE instead of polling)
• Moderation tools (reports, admin queue, post removal, account suspension)
• Email verification and password reset (Resend)

License

MIT

Commune

An open source community platform built with the MERN stack and TypeScript.

Commune is a production-minded, full-stack reference project: secure authentication, posts, comments and likes, a shared validation layer, Docker support and CI, all in a clean monorepo that's easy to read, run and extend.

Features

• Secure auth with short-lived JWT access tokens and rotating httpOnly refresh cookies
• Posts, comments and likes with cursor-based pagination
• Shared Zod schemas used by both frontend and backend
• Helmet, rate limiting, input validation and centralized error handling
• Docker Compose for MongoDB and the API, plus a GitHub Actions workflow

Contributing

Contributions of all sizes are welcome. Look for issues labeled good first issue, read CONTRIBUTING.md, and open a pull request.