IdeaForge

IdeaForge is a full-stack MERN SaaS productivity workspace for managing projects, tasks, teams, meetings, notifications, analytics, reports, global search, and Google productivity integrations from one deployed application.

Important Links

Live	API	Postman	Demo	Figma
Project	Backend	Docs	YouTube	Design

Repositories: Personal Fork | Official Coding Gita Repository

Problem Statement

Startup teams and student project teams often manage ideas, tasks, meetings, project updates, team members, and productivity tools across disconnected platforms. This creates scattered communication, unclear task ownership, weak visibility, and difficulty tracking progress from idea to execution.

Solution

IdeaForge solves this by providing a single SaaS-style workspace where users can authenticate, manage projects, create and assign tasks, collaborate in teams, schedule meetings, track dashboard analytics, view reports, search globally, receive notifications, and connect Google services such as OAuth, Gmail, and Calendar.

The platform is built with a production-ready MERN architecture, deployed on Render, connected to MongoDB Atlas, and documented with Postman for API evaluation.

Features

• Authentication with email/password, HTTP-only JWT cookies, protected routes, and Google OAuth.
• Dashboard with live stats, recent projects, tasks, meetings, Gmail preview, notifications, and AI-style briefing.
• Project, task, team, and meeting CRUD with personal/team access control.
• Team collaboration with owner/admin/member roles, member invitations, role updates, and notifications.
• Google Calendar and Gmail integrations through OAuth.
• Reports, analytics, global search, quick actions, settings, and responsive UI.
• SEO implementation with React Helmet, dynamic metadata, Open Graph, Twitter cards, sitemap, robots, schema.org, and Postman API documentation.

Tech Stack

Area	Technologies
Frontend	React, Vite, React Router, Tailwind CSS, Material UI, Redux Toolkit, Formik, Yup, Axios, React Helmet Async
Backend	Node.js, Express.js, MongoDB Atlas, Mongoose, JWT, HTTP-only cookies, bcryptjs
Integrations	Google OAuth, Gmail API, Google Calendar API
Tools	Render, Postman, MongoDB Compass, GitHub, Google Cloud Console, Figma

Folder Structure

IdeaForge/
  backend/
    config/
      db.js
    controllers/
      calendarController.js
      dashboardController.js
      gmailController.js
      googleAuthController.js
      meetingController.js
      notificationController.js
      projectController.js
      reportController.js
      searchController.js
      taskController.js
      teamController.js
      userController.js
    middleware/
      authMiddleware.js
      errorMiddleware.js
    models/
      meetingModel.js
      notificationModel.js
      projectModel.js
      taskModel.js
      teamModel.js
      userModel.js
    routes/
      calendarRoutes.js
      dashboardRoutes.js
      gmailRoutes.js
      googleAuthRoutes.js
      meetingRoutes.js
      notificationRoutes.js
      projectRoutes.js
      reportRoutes.js
      searchRoutes.js
      taskRoutes.js
      teamRoutes.js
      userRoutes.js
    utils/
      generateToken.js
    server.js
  frontend/
    public/
      robots.txt
      sitemap.xml
    src/
      components/
      context/
      hooks/
      pages/
      services/
      store/
      utils/
      App.jsx
      main.jsx

Project Screenshots

Landing Page

The landing page presents IdeaForge as an AI-first MERN SaaS workspace for startup operations, project planning, team workflows, pricing, and execution.

API Overview

Base API URL:

https://crmideaforge.onrender.com/api

Main API modules:

• /api - health check
• /api/users - register, login, logout, profile
• /api/auth/google - Google OAuth login, callback, and debug
• /api/projects - project CRUD
• /api/tasks - task CRUD
• /api/teams - team and member management
• /api/meetings - meeting CRUD
• /api/calendar - Google Calendar data
• /api/gmail - Gmail recent emails
• /api/dashboard - dashboard stats
• /api/reports - report analytics
• /api/notifications - notification inbox
• /api/search - global search

Full API documentation:

https://documenter.getpostman.com/view/50839203/2sBXqKoKkY

SEO Implementation

• Dynamic route-level titles and meta descriptions.
• Open Graph metadata for better sharing previews.
• Twitter card metadata.
• Schema.org SoftwareApplication structured data.
• robots.txt included in frontend public assets.
• sitemap.xml included in frontend public assets.
• Production canonical URL configured for the deployed Render app.

Official Checklist Coverage

The project implements the important features expected in the Coding Gita full-stack checklist:

• React project setup with clean component structure.
• Routing with public and protected pages.
• Authentication and route protection.
• API integration using Axios.
• Reusable components, forms, modals, cards, sidebar, and dashboard widgets.
• Form validation with Formik and Yup.
• State management with Redux Toolkit and Context.
• MongoDB models and relationships.
• Express REST APIs with controllers, routes, middleware, and error handling.
• CRUD operations for projects, tasks, teams, and meetings.
• Local storage/session storage usage for non-sensitive UI state.
• HTTP-only cookie usage for JWT security.
• Google OAuth and Google API integrations.
• Responsive UI.
• SEO implementation.
• Deployment-ready production build.
• Postman documentation.

Local Setup

Backend

cd backend
npm install
cp .env.example .env
npm run dev

Required backend environment variables:

NODE_ENV=development
PORT=5000
MONGO_URI=your_mongodb_connection_string
JWT_SECRET=your_long_random_secret
FRONTEND_URL=http://localhost:5173
CORS_ORIGIN=http://localhost:5173
GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID=your_google_client_id
GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET=your_google_client_secret
GOOGLE_CALLBACK_URL=http://localhost:5000/api/auth/google/callback

Frontend

cd frontend
npm install
cp .env.example .env
npm run dev

Frontend environment variables:

VITE_API_BASE_URL=/api
VITE_GA_MEASUREMENT_ID=
VITE_PUBLIC_APP_URL=http://localhost:5173

Local frontend URL:

http://localhost:5173

Deployment

The project is deployed on Render as a MERN monorepo where the Express backend serves the Vite frontend production build.

Production URLs:

Frontend: https://crmideaforge.onrender.com
Backend API: https://crmideaforge.onrender.com/api

Required production environment variables:

NODE_ENV=production
PORT=10000
MONGO_URI=your_mongodb_atlas_connection_string
JWT_SECRET=your_long_random_secret
FRONTEND_URL=https://crmideaforge.onrender.com
CORS_ORIGIN=https://crmideaforge.onrender.com
GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID=your_google_client_id
GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET=your_google_client_secret
GOOGLE_CALLBACK_URL=https://crmideaforge.onrender.com/api/auth/google/callback
DNS_SERVERS=1.1.1.1,8.8.8.8

Google Cloud OAuth redirect URI:

https://crmideaforge.onrender.com/api/auth/google/callback

Validation

Frontend production build:

cd frontend
npm run build

Latest build status: passed.

AI Assistance Disclosure

This project was initially developed with Antigravity assistance and later refined with Codex assistance for final-phase implementation, checklist mapping, deployment fixes, SEO, README updates, and Postman documentation support.

Author

Khush Patel