Tweetly

A Django-based social networking application where users can share posts, upload images, interact through likes and comments, and manage personalized profiles.

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About

Tweetly is a Twitter-inspired social media platform that demonstrates core social networking features. Users can create accounts, publish posts with text and images, engage through likes and comments, and customize their profiles. The application is deployed on Render using Supabase PostgreSQL and Cloudinary for media storage.

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Features

User Management

• Secure registration and authentication system
• Automatic profile creation with bio and profile picture support
• User-specific tweet timelines

Content Creation

• Create, edit, and delete tweets with text and images
• Image upload and hosting via Cloudinary
• Ownership-based permissions for content management

Social Interactions

• Like and unlike tweets with real-time count updates
• Comment on tweets with nested reply support
• Threaded discussion system

User Interface

• Responsive design using Bootstrap 5
• Home feed displaying recent tweets
• Individual profile and tweet detail pages

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Tech Stack

Backend

• Django 5.2 with Python 3.x
• PostgreSQL (Supabase) for production
• SQLite for local development
• Django ORM for database operations

Media Storage

• Cloudinary for image hosting

Deployment

• Render platform
• Gunicorn WSGI server
• WhiteNoise for static files

Frontend

• Django Templates with Bootstrap 5
• Custom CSS

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Installation

Prerequisites

• Python 3.8 or higher
• pip package manager
• Git
• Cloudinary account
• Supabase account (for production)

Setup Steps

Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/AbhijithX001/tweetly.git
cd tweetly

Create and activate virtual environment

python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate  # On Windows: venv\Scripts\activate

Install dependencies

pip install -r requirements.txt

Configure environment variables

Create a .env file:

DJANGO_SECRET_KEY=your_django_secret_key
DEBUG=True
CLOUDINARY_URL=cloudinary://api_key:api_secret@cloud_name

Run migrations and create superuser

python manage.py migrate
python manage.py createsuperuser

Start development server

python manage.py runserver

Visit http://127.0.0.1:8000/

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Configuration

Cloudinary Setup

1. Sign up at Cloudinary
2. Get credentials from Dashboard
3. Add CLOUDINARY_URL to .env file

Database Configuration

Development: Uses SQLite by default

Production: Configure PostgreSQL connection string in DATABASE_URL environment variable:

DATABASE_URL=postgresql://user:password@host:port/database

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Database Models

User Model

• Django's built-in User model with authentication

Profile Model

• One-to-one with User
• Fields: bio, profile_image, created_at
• Auto-created on user registration

Tweet Model

• Fields: user, text, photo, created_at, updated_at, likes
• Many-to-Many relationship for likes

Comment Model

• Fields: user, tweet, text, parent, created_at
• Self-referential foreign key for nested replies

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Deployment

Render Deployment

Prepare for production

pip install gunicorn dj-database-url psycopg2-binary whitenoise
pip freeze > requirements.txt

Create Procfile

web: gunicorn tweetly_project.wsgi:application

Configure production settings

• Set DEBUG=False
• Configure ALLOWED_HOSTS to include .onrender.com
• Set up Supabase PostgreSQL database URL
• Add Cloudinary credentials as environment variables

Deploy

1. Create a Supabase PostgreSQL database (free tier: 500MB)
2. Push code to GitHub
3. Connect repository to Render
4. Set environment variables in Render dashboard:
   • DJANGO_SECRET_KEY
   • DATABASE_URL (from Supabase)
   • CLOUDINARY_URL
   • DEBUG=False
5. Render automatically deploys the application

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Security

Implemented measures:

• Password hashing using Django's authentication system
• CSRF protection on all forms
• Login required decorators for protected views
• Ownership validation for edit/delete operations
• Environment variables for sensitive data
• XSS and SQL injection protection via Django defaults

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Future Enhancements

• Real-time notifications for interactions
• Direct messaging system
• Follow/follower functionality
• Hashtag and trending topics
• User mentions with @ functionality
• Tweet bookmarks and retweets
• Email verification and password reset
• Advanced search and filtering
• Mobile application
• Content moderation tools

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Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please fork the repository, create a feature branch, commit your changes, and open a Pull Request with a detailed description.

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License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

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Contact

Author: Abhijith P

GitHub: https://github.com/AbhijithX001

Email: abhijith26p@gmail.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhijith-p11/

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Acknowledgments

• Django Framework documentation
• Cloudinary for media storage
• Supabase for PostgreSQL database
• Render for deployment platform
• Bootstrap 5 for UI components
• Open-source community

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Live Demo: https://tweetly-adhi.onrender.com

If you find this project useful, please give it a star on GitHub!