Twitter Clone

A mini-featured Twitter-like social media platform built with Ruby on Rails 7.2, Hotwire.

Table of Contents

• Features
• Technical Design
• Database Schema
• Setup & Installation
• Running Tests
• Deployment
• Contributing
• License

---

Features

• Authentication: Secure registration, login, logout, password reset, and account email activation.
• Microposts: Users can create, display, and delete tweets (microposts) with optional image uploads.
• User Profiles: View user info, avatar (Gravatar), micropost count, and follow/follower stats.
• Feed: Personalized feed showing own and followed users' posts.
• Follow System: Follow/unfollow users, see followers/following lists and counts.
• Responsive UI: Mobile-ready, Twitter-inspired design using SCSS.
• Email Notifications: Activation and password reset emails via ActionMailer.
• Docker Support: Containerized for easy local development and deployment.

---

Technical Design

Architecture Overview

• MVC Structure: Rails models for Users, Microposts, Relationships; RESTful controllers and ERB views.
• Authentication: Secure password handling with bcrypt, persistent sessions, and token-based account activation.
• Microposts: Text (max 140 chars), optional image uploads via ActiveStorage, ordered by most recent.
• Feed Algorithm: User feed combines own microposts and posts from followed users, efficiently indexed.
• Follow System: Self-referential Relationship model tracks who follows whom; bi-directional associations for followers and following.
• Frontend: Uses Hotwire (Turbo/Stimulus) for fast, real-time updates; Importmap for JS management.
• Styling: Custom SCSS for layouts, user lists, microposts, stats, and responsive design.
• Mailer: ActionMailer for email delivery; mailer previews for development.
• Docker: Multi-stage Dockerfile for building, assets precompilation, and lightweight runtime.

Key Models & Associations

• User
  • Has many microposts (dependent destroy)
  • Has many active and passive relationships (for follows/followers)
  • Validations: name, email (format, uniqueness), password
  • Authentication: password_digest, remember/activation/reset tokens
• Micropost
  • Belongs to user
  • Validates content length and presence
  • Supports image attachment (ActiveStorage)
• Relationship
  • Belongs to follower and followed (User)
  • Enforces unique follower-followed pairs

---

Database Schema

Entity Relationship Diagram

users
 ├─ id : PK
 ├─ name : string
 ├─ email : string (unique)
 ├─ password_digest : string
 ├─ remember_digest : string
 ├─ admin : boolean
 ├─ activation_digest : string
 ├─ activated : boolean
 ├─ activated_at : datetime
 ├─ reset_digest : string
 ├─ reset_sent_at : datetime
 └─ timestamps

microposts
 ├─ id : PK
 ├─ content : text
 ├─ user_id : FK → users.id
 ├─ created_at, updated_at
 └─ indexes: [user_id, created_at]

relationships
 ├─ id : PK
 ├─ follower_id : FK → users.id
 ├─ followed_id : FK → users.id
 ├─ timestamps
 └─ unique index: [follower_id, followed_id]

(active_storage tables for images)

---

Setup & Installation

Prerequisites

• Ruby (>= 3.2), Bundler
• Node.js & Yarn (if working with assets)
• Docker (optional)
• SQLite3 (default; swap for PostgreSQL/MySQL as needed)

Local Setup

git clone https://github.com/amrhossamdev/twitter-clone.git
cd twitter-clone
gem install bundler
bundle install
bin/rails db:setup
bin/rails db:seed   # (optional: loads sample users and microposts)
bin/rails server
# Visit http://localhost:3000

Docker Setup

docker build -t twitter-clone .
docker run -p 3000:3000 twitter-clone

---

Running Tests

bin/rails test

Includes model, controller, and integration tests for core features.

---

Deployment

• Prepare assets and environment variables as needed.
• Use Docker or standard Rails deployment.
• Email delivery requires SMTP configuration.

---

Contributing

1. Fork the repo and clone locally.
2. Create a feature branch (git checkout -b feature-branch)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add feature')
4. Push and open a Pull Request.

---

License

MIT

---

Credits

Inspired by the Ruby on Rails Tutorial, Michael Hartl, and Twitter’s feature set.

For questions or issues, open a GitHub issue.