"The best ideas come from collaboration, water, and probably a bit of back pain." - Me, after my 20-hour coding marathon
Welcome to my pride and joy - a real-time collaborative notepad that's more fun than trying to teach your grandma how to Zoom!
- Enhanced Error Handling - Friendly error pages with auto-redirect
- Improved UI/UX - Smoother animations and transitions
- Better Mobile Support - Fully responsive on all devices
- Multiple Deployment Options - Support for Vercel, Netlify, and Render
- Dark/Light Mode - Save your eyes, save the world
- Real-time Collaboration - See who's typing in real-time
- Custom URLs - Create memorable links like "my-awesome-note"
- Admin Dashboard - Monitor active notes and usage statistics
- Secure Admin Access - Password-protected admin panel
- Real-time Stats - Live updates of active notes and users
Yes, it actually looks this good. No, I didn't use filters!
After 20 hours of relentless coding, countless water refills, one serious back pain (desperately need a chair 🪑), and an existential crisis later, this beauty finally went live! Why? Because I believe sharing notes shouldn't be harder than explaining to yourself why you didn't invest in a proper chair before this coding marathon.
- Real-time Collaboration - Watch your friends type in real-time (while you do some stretching)
- Custom URLs - Create memorable links like "my-back-is-killing-me"
- Dark Mode - For vampires, developers, and people who've lost track of day and night
- User Counter - See how many people are enjoying this while you can't even sit properly
- Responsive Design - Works on everything from your fancy iPhone to that potato you call a laptop
- Auto-Save - Because we all have trust issues after that one time we lost our work
- Error Handling - Friendly error pages that won't scare your users away
- Admin Features:
- Secure admin login with password protection
- Real-time monitoring of active notes
- View all notes with content previews
- Track total and active note counts
- Simple password management
- Node.js - Because JavaScript everywhere!
- Socket.IO - Real-time magic ✨
- MongoDB - Where your notes go to live forever
- Express - The backend framework that makes everything express(ly) better
- EJS - Templates that don't make you cry
- CSS Magic - Making things pretty since... well, since I learned CSS
- bcrypt - Keeping admin passwords safe and sound
- express-session - Managing admin sessions like a boss
# Clone this beauty
git clone https://github.com/sh13y/collaborative-notepad.git
# Enter the matrix
cd collaborative-notepad
# Install dependencies (grab some water, this might take a while)
npm install
# Set up your environment
cp .env.example .env
# Now edit .env with your MongoDB connection string
# Start the magic
npm start
# Visit http://localhost:3000 and prepare to be amazed# Just push to GitHub and connect with Render
# Set environment variables in Render dashboard:
- MONGODB_URI=your_mongodb_uri
- NODE_ENV=production# Install Vercel CLI
npm i -g vercel
# Deploy
vercel# Install Netlify CLI
npm i -g netlify-cli
# Deploy
netlify deploy- Visit the deployed URL
- Start typing like you're writing the next great novel
- Share the URL with friends (yes, you need friends for this part)
- Watch the magic happen in real-time
- Toggle dark mode when you're feeling mysterious
- Create custom URLs for your notes
- Enjoy the smooth error handling when something goes wrong
- Access admin panel at
/admin(first visit sets up password) - Monitor your notepad empire from the admin dashboard
Because Google Docs is too mainstream, and passing notes in class is so last century. Also, I spent way too much time building this to not show it off.
First, try turning it off and on again. If that doesn't work:
- Check if Mercury is in retrograde
- Make sure your computer isn't possessed
- Open an issue
- Or better yet, fix it and submit a PR!
If this project has saved you from the horrors of email attachments or helped you procrastinate effectively, consider:
- Back Pain Relief Fund 🪑🤕 (Seriously, 20 hours of coding on a bad chair is NOT fun)
- Starring this repo (it's free and makes the pain slightly more bearable)
- Telling your developer friends to maintain good posture (we all need this reminder)
MIT Licensed - Which means you can do whatever you want with it, just don't blame me if your cat accidentally deletes your notes by walking on the keyboard!
Engineered with ❤️ from the floor, debugged with 💪, powered by 💧, and brought to you by sh13y – the developer who turned back pain into a feature, not a bug 🪑✨
P.S. If you've read this far, you deserve a cookie 🍪 and probably need a hobby (and a better chair than mine).
P.P.S. Yes, this README took longer to write than some of the actual features, mostly because I had to keep standing up to stretch.
After 20 hours of relentless patience, debugging, and sheer determination (not to mention a lot of water and back stretches), Collaborative Notepad is finally live on the internet! Who knew that the journey from npm start to "deployment success" could feel like a chiropractor's waiting list? 😅
Take a moment to appreciate the beauty of the internet: it took 20 hours and my spine... but hey, better late than never, right?