Mentora — Centralized Academic & Real-Time Educational Platform

Mentora is a production-grade, secure, modern educational web platform connecting Students, Teachers, and Administrators in a unified portal for academic management, assignment submissions, attendance tracking, study resource sharing, discussion forums, and real-time STOMP WebSocket messaging.

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Key Features

• ** Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)**: Distinct permissions and interactive portals for STUDENT, TEACHER, and ADMIN.
• ** Real-Time Messaging**: STOMP over WebSockets for 1-on-1 teacher-student chat and class discussion rooms.
• ** Academic Management**: Department, course, subject, and weekly timetable management.
• ** Assignments & Grading**: Assignment creation, deadline tracking, solution file upload, grading, and teacher feedback.
• ** Attendance & Analytics**: Class attendance marking, student percentage tracking, and CGPA metrics.
• ** Interactive Discussion Forum**: Q&A community forum with category filters, upvotes, and answer thread replies.
• ** Notice Board**: Priority-coded system and department announcement broadcasts.
• ** Study Material Hub**: Categorized resource repository for slides, reference manuals, and code samples.
• ** Modern UI/UX**: Dark/Light mode theme engine, glassmorphic layout cards, responsive mobile sidebar, and smooth micro-interactions.

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Project Architecture

Mentora is structured as a full-stack project containing two main subdirectories:

Mentora/
├── PROMPT.md               # Master AI Prompt Specification
├── README.md               # Project Documentation & Run Guide
├── mentora-backend/        # Java 21 Spring Boot 3.x REST & WebSocket Service
│   ├── src/main/java/com/mentora/
│   │   ├── config/         # Security, CORS, WebSockets, Data Seed Initializer
│   │   ├── controller/     # Auth, User, Academic, Assignment, Chat Controllers
│   │   ├── dto/            # Data Transfer Objects
│   │   ├── entity/         # 18 JPA Entities & Domain Enums
│   │   ├── repository/     # Spring Data JPA Interfaces
│   │   └── security/       # JWT Tokens & Custom UserDetailsService
│   └── pom.xml             # Maven Project Dependencies
└── mentora-frontend/       # React 18 + TypeScript + Vite + Tailwind CSS Web Client
    ├── src/
    │   ├── components/     # Navbar, Sidebar, DashboardLayout
    │   ├── context/        # AuthContext, ThemeContext
    │   ├── pages/          # Student, Teacher, Admin, Chat, Forum, Materials
    │   └── services/       # Axios API client with JWT Header Interceptor
    └── package.json

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Test Account Credentials

The backend automatically seeds the database on startup with ready-to-use test accounts:

Role	Email	Password
Student	student@mentora.com	Password123!
Teacher	teacher@mentora.com	Password123!
Admin	admin@mentora.com	Password123!

Note: Quick-login shortcut buttons are also built directly into the Login screen for instant testing.

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Getting Started

1. Backend Setup (mentora-backend)

Prerequisites

• Java 21+ JDK

Run locally:

cd mentora-backend
mvn spring-boot:run

The REST API server will start on http://localhost:8080.

• H2 In-Memory DB Console: http://localhost:8080/h2-console (JDBC URL: jdbc:h2:mem:mentoradb, Username: sa, Password: empty)
• Swagger / OpenAPI Documentation: http://localhost:8080/swagger-ui.html

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2. Frontend Setup (mentora-frontend)

Prerequisites

• Node.js v18+ and npm

Run locally:

cd mentora-frontend
npm install
npm run dev

The React development server will launch on http://localhost:3000.

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Deployment Guide

• Database: Neon PostgreSQL (Set spring.datasource.url in application.yml for production).
• Backend Service: Render / Railway (Deploy mentora-backend using Docker or Java runtime).
• Frontend App: Vercel / Netlify (Deploy mentora-frontend with build command npm run build).