Heap-recipes

Heap-recipes is a simple recipe website developed by Hanna Adenholm and Erik Persson.

Built with

Getting Started

Based on experience from Erik Persson setting it up from scratch in March 2026. A improved tutorial will come soon (hopefully)

1. Install dependencies

npm install
npm run setup

2. Start the database

docker compose up db

3. Backend configuration

Create the file: server/appsettings.json

Replace YOUR_USERNAME and A_STRONG_PASSWORD with your PostgreSQL credentials.

{
  "ConnectionStrings": {
    "DefaultConnection": "Host=localhost;Port=5432;Database=heap_recipes;Username=YOUR_USERNAME;Password=A_STRONG_PASSWORD"
  },
  "Jwt": {
    "Key": "dev-secret-key-12345678901234567890",
    "Issuer": "HeapRecipesApi",
    "Audience": "HeapRecipesApiUsers",
    "ExpireMinutes": "60"
  }
}

5. To set up a database for development, you may create a ´´´docker-compose.override.yml´´´ file with the following content:

services:
  db:
    ports:
      - "5432:5432"

This will expose the docker database to port 5432 on your local machine, allowing you to connect to it

6. Create a user

Send a POST request to: /api/auth/register

Example request body:

{
  "id": 1,
  "username": "Hanna"
}

Notes

• JWT Tokens uses HS256 and must therefore be at least 32 characters, otherwise it will not work (and be insecure)