Setup Guide

1. Prerequisites

• Node.js: Download here
• Docker: Download here
• Git: Download here

2. Clone the Repository

In you terminal:

git clone https://github.com/usdevs/lms.git
cd lms

3. Install Dependencies

npm install

This will also run prisma generate automatically via the postinstall script.

4. Database Setup

The app uses PostgreSQL with Prisma as the ORM.

For local dev, we will run the Postgres locally with Docker using the provided docker-compose.yaml

From the project root:

docker compose up -d

This starts a Postgres 17 container with:

• Host port: 5432
• User: postgres
• Password: postgres123
• Database: lms_dev

4.2. Configure Environment Variables

Create a .env file in the project root (if it doesn’t exist yet) and define the Prisma connection URLs.

At minimum, you should have:

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://postgres:postgres123@localhost:5432/lms_dev?schema=public"
DIRECT_URL="postgresql://postgres:postgres123@localhost:5432/lms_dev?schema=public"

• DATABASE_URL: Used by Prisma Client at runtime
• DIRECT_URL: Used by Prisma Migrate to apply migrations directly

If you are not using Docker, adjust the host, port, user, password, and database to match your own Postgres instance.

5. Run Prisma Migrations

Once the database is running and .env is configured:

npx prisma migrate dev --name init

This will:

• Create the database schema defined in here
• Apply all migrations to your Postgres instance
• Regenerate the Prisma Client

For more detail on migration workflows, see here

6. Seed Data (Optional)

To seed the database with test data as defined here,

npx prisma db seed

7. Run the App in Development

Start the Next.js dev server:

npm run dev

Then open http://localhost:3000 in your browser.

8. Troubleshooting

• Database connection errors

  • Ensure Docker is running (if using Docker)
  • Check that DATABASE_URL and DIRECT_URL in .env are correct
  • Confirm Postgres is listening on the expected host/port

• Prisma migration issues

  • See DB GUIDE.md for detailed instructions on migrations and common errors

9. Others

For more information on the design, read here

For more information on the functionality plans, read here