Study

Find and manage CMU study groups.

A Next.js app deployed by kennel.

One-time setup

Install devenv and its shell hooks (stop before devenv init), then sign in to OpenBao so secretspec can resolve this project’s secrets:

nix run git+https://git.cmu.dev/ScottyLabs/kennel#login

Running the app

Make sure you run devenv allow the first time you open the shell so the environment loads properly!

Starting services (postgres, ricochet):

devenv up

Once you see postgres ready and ricochet running, open a devenv shell:

devenv shell
npm ci
migrate               # applies prisma migrations

Run the app in the same devenv shell:

npm run dev

Keep devenv up running in its own terminal.

Database

devenv up runs PostgreSQL on a unix socket and exports DATABASE_URL. There is no password and no port to configure.

Deployed services migrate themselves on startup, so a migration ships with the commit that needs it.

Environment

Secrets live in OpenBao, declared in secretspec.toml and resolved per environment by profile. Kennel supplies DATABASE_URL, PORT, and APP_URL at runtime, so none of those are declared as secrets.

Only src/env.js may read the environment at runtime. Next inlines any direct process.env.FOO at build time, so a value read that way in a component or route handler is whatever it was during the build, not during the request.

You do not need a .env anymore, unless you are working on a feature that requires adding new environment variables that do not exist in OpenBao yet. You should delete your .env (or clear it) so it doesn’t overwrite the OpenBao variables.

Deployment

Pushing main, staging, or dev deploys that branch. Any other branch is deployed as a preview once a pull request is open, at study-web-pr-<number>.scottylabs.net. Progress shows up as the kennel/build and kennel/deploy commit statuses, and production is served at cmustudy.com.

Project structure

• src/app contains Next.js routes and route layouts.
• src/features/groups contains study-group components, hooks, services, filters, and constants.
• src/features/profile contains profile components, hooks, services, and profile-specific types.
• src/components contains shared layout, provider, and UI components.
• src/helpers contains external integration helpers such as calendar/date utilities.
• src/server/api contains the Hono API application and route composition.
• src/styles contains global and component-level CSS.
• flake.nix builds the deployable package
• devenv.nix declares the development environment and what kennel deploys.