USContentHub

A Django-powered content platform hosting 7 niche websites for US audiences, covering tech, health, finance, travel, recipes, news, and trading. Articles are served as static HTML on GitHub Pages, with a full Django backend on Vercel for the main blog platform.

Publications

Publication	Niche	Articles	URL
Tech Gadget Hub	Technology & Gadgets	~34	Visit
Health & Wellness Daily	Health & Wellness	~53	Visit
Smart Money Guide	Personal Finance	~31	Visit
USA Travel Explorer	Travel	~67	Visit
Recipe Kitchen USA	Recipes & Food	~67	Visit
USA News Digest	News & Trends	~62	Visit
The Trading Blueprint	Trading & Investing	~18	Visit

Project Structure

USContentHub/
├── api/
│   └── index.py                  # Vercel WSGI entry point
├── blog/                         # Django app (models, views, templates, URLs)
│   ├── migrations/               # 4 database migrations
│   ├── templates/blog/           # 14 Django HTML templates
│   ├── management/commands/      # import_blogs CLI command
│   ├── models.py                 # Publication, Article, Comment, Rating, etc.
│   ├── views.py                  # All views (home, article, search, auth, etc.)
│   ├── urls.py                   # URL routing
│   ├── sitemaps.py               # XML sitemaps
│   └── tests.py                  # Full test suite (1100+ lines)
├── writeflow/                    # Django project settings
│   ├── settings.py               # DB, cache, email, security, auth config
│   ├── urls.py                   # Root URL conf + sitemap
│   └── wsgi.py / asgi.py
├── sites/                        # Static HTML content per publication
│   ├── tech-gadget-hub/
│   ├── health-wellness-daily/
│   ├── smart-money-guide/
│   ├── usa-travel-explorer/
│   ├── recipe-kitchen-usa/
│   ├── usa-news-digest/
│   ├── the-trading-blueprint/
│   └── _low_quality/             # Articles with SEO score < 80 (not deployed)
├── pinterest_bot/
│   ├── pinterest_auto_pin.py     # Pinterest v5 API bot (7 pins/day)
│   └── pinned_tracker.json       # Tracks which articles have been pinned
├── .github/workflows/
│   ├── pinterest-daily.yml       # Daily cron: pins 1 article per publication
│   ├── deploy-sites.yml          # Deploys HTML sites to GitHub Pages
│   └── build-dashboard.yml       # Rebuilds dashboard.html on content push
├── dashboard.html                # Content stats dashboard
├── update_articles_json.py       # Utility: regenerates articles.json per site
├── manage.py
├── requirements.txt
├── vercel.json                   # Vercel deployment config
└── .env.example                  # Environment variable template

Local Development

Requirements

• Python 3.11+
• pip
• PostgreSQL connection string (DATABASE_URL), for example Neon in production

Setup

# 1. Clone and enter the project
git clone https://github.com/Tusharlimbasiya-200-silveroak/USContentHub.git
cd USContentHub

# 2. Create a virtual environment
python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate   # Windows: venv\Scripts\activate

# 3. Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

# 4. Copy environment file and configure
cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env — set DJANGO_SECRET_KEY and DATABASE_URL

# 5. Run migrations
python manage.py migrate

# 6. Load initial data (optional)
python manage.py loaddata blog/fixtures/initial_data.json

# 7. Start the development server
python manage.py runserver

Open http://localhost:8000 in your browser.

Running Tests

python manage.py test blog

Publishing content (single source of truth)

The database is the source of truth; the static GitHub Pages sites are a generated artifact. Publish a new article with one command so the Vercel (Neon) site and the GitHub Pages site stay in lockstep:

# Write a draft JSON (see publish.py docstring for the schema; `content` is the
# CLEAN body HTML only — no breadcrumb/newsletter/share chrome).
DATABASE_URL='postgres://…neon…' python3 publish.py drafts/my-article.json --commit
git push        # deploy-sites.yml then ships the static side to gh-pages

publish.py upserts the article into the DB, then runs export_static to (re)generate the article HTML + articles.json entry + homepage card + sitemap URL for that publication. export_static is idempotent and non-lossy — it only touches the given slug and preserves the extra articles.json fields the DB does not model.

• python manage.py export_static --slug <slug> [--check] — render specific articles from the DB.
• python manage.py import_blogs — legacy static→DB bridge; also runs in CI (sync-db.yml) as a drift safety net. Additive (skips existing slugs).

Never paste the production DATABASE_URL on the command line interactively — set it as a GitHub Actions secret (below) and let CI run the DB writes.

Deployment

Vercel (Django backend)

The Django app is deployed to Vercel via api/index.py. Required environment variables (set in Vercel dashboard):

Variable	Purpose
DJANGO_SECRET_KEY	Strong random key — required
DJANGO_DEBUG	Set to False in production
DATABASE_URL	PostgreSQL/Neon connection string — required
DJANGO_ALLOWED_HOSTS	Comma-separated allowed hosts; include custom domains
DATABASE_TEST_NAME	Optional explicit test DB name for manage.py test
REDIS_URL	Redis/Upstash connection string — recommended for production scale
SITE_URL	Your production URL
EMAIL_HOST	SMTP host for newsletter emails
EMAIL_HOST_USER	SMTP username
EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD	SMTP password
GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID / GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET	Google OAuth (optional)

GitHub Pages (Static sites)

Each active sites/<publication>/ folder is deployed to its own GitHub Pages repo via the deploy-sites.yml workflow. Triggered on any push to sites/**.

Database sync (sync-db.yml)

On every push to sites/**, this workflow mirrors any new articles into the Neon database so the dynamic site never falls behind GitHub Pages. It reads credentials from GitHub Secrets — never from the repo:

• DATABASE_URL — the Neon/PostgreSQL connection string (same value as Vercel)
• DJANGO_SECRET_KEY — any strong key (only needed for Django to boot)

Add them in repo Settings → Secrets and variables → Actions.

Pinterest Bot

The pinterest_bot/pinterest_auto_pin.py script runs daily via GitHub Actions (.github/workflows/pinterest-daily.yml). It pins 1 article per publication per day.

Required GitHub Secrets:

• PINTEREST_ACCESS_TOKEN
• PINTEREST_BOARD_TECH, PINTEREST_BOARD_HEALTH, PINTEREST_BOARD_FINANCE
• PINTEREST_BOARD_TRAVEL, PINTEREST_BOARD_RECIPES, PINTEREST_BOARD_NEWS, PINTEREST_BOARD_TRADING
• SITE_URL, DEPLOY_TOKEN

Tech Stack

• Backend: Django 6.x + WhiteNoise + django-allauth
• Database: PostgreSQL
• Cache: Redis (production) / LocMemCache (development)
• Hosting: Vercel (Django) + GitHub Pages (static sites)
• Automation: GitHub Actions (deploy, Pinterest bot, dashboard)
• Auth: Custom auth + Google & Microsoft OAuth via django-allauth