Academic Progress Monitoring Platform

A distributed microservices application for managing student attendance, assignments, and academic progress. Built with Spring Boot, gRPC, RabbitMQ, Docker, and Kubernetes.

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Architecture Overview

Browser/Client
      ↓
BFF (Port 8080) — JWT validation, request proxying
      ↓
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                Internal Services                 │
├─────────────────┬───────────────────────────────┤
│ Auth Service    │ Student Service (+ gRPC)       │
│ Port 8081       │ Port 8082 / gRPC 9090          │
├─────────────────┼───────────────────────────────┤
│ Attendance      │ Assignment Service             │
│ Service 8083    │ Port 8084                      │
├─────────────────┴───────────────────────────────┤
│ Notification Service — Port 8085                 │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
      ↓
RabbitMQ (Event Bus)

Services

Service	Port	Description
BFF	8080	Backend-for-Frontend, JWT validation, proxying
Auth Service	8081	User registration, login, JWT generation
Student Service	8082	Student profiles, gRPC endpoint
Attendance Service	8083	Attendance recording, 3-absence warning bot
Assignment Service	8084	Assignment management, grading
Notification Service	8085	Email notifications via RabbitMQ events

Databases

Database	Port	Service
authdb	5432	Auth Service
studentdb	5433	Student Service
attendancedb	5434	Attendance Service
assignmentdb	5435	Assignment Service
notificationdb	5436	Notification Service

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Tech Stack

• Backend: Java 24, Spring Boot 4.0.6
• Communication: REST API, gRPC 1.77.1, RabbitMQ
• Authentication: JWT (jjwt 0.12.6)
• Database: PostgreSQL 16
• Frontend: Thymeleaf (server-side templates)
• Containerization: Docker
• Orchestration: Kubernetes (Minikube)
• Email: Mailtrap (development SMTP)

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Features

Teacher

• Register and manage students
• Record attendance (Present, Late, Absent, Sick)
• Create assignments for all students at once
• Grade assignments with feedback categories
• Dashboard with overview stats and pending submissions

Student

• View profile and attendance statistics
• See active and completed assignments
• Submit assignments with comments
• View grades and teacher feedback
• Receive email notifications for new assignments and grades

Automated (Event-Driven)

• Attendance warning fires automatically after 3 absences
• Email reminders sent when assignments are created
• Email notifications sent when assignments are graded

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Event Flow

Assignment created → assignment.exchange → assignment-created queue
                                        → Notification Service → Email

Student submits  → assignment.exchange → assignment-graded queue
                                       → Notification Service → Email

3rd absence recorded → attendance.exchange → attendance-warning queue
                                           → Notification Service → Email

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Running Locally

Prerequisites

• Docker Desktop
• Java 24
• Maven 3.9+

Start all services with Docker Compose

# Build all jars
cd auth-service && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..
cd studentservice && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..
cd attendanceservice && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..
cd assignmentservice && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..
cd notificationservice && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..
cd bff && mvn clean package -DskipTests && cd ..

# Build Docker images
docker compose build

# Start everything
docker compose up -d

# Check all containers are running
docker compose ps

Open browser at: http://localhost:8080

Stop everything

docker compose down

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Running in Kubernetes (VG)

Prerequisites

• Minikube
• kubectl

Start

# Start Minikube
minikube start --driver=docker --memory=4096 --cpus=2

# Load Docker images into Minikube
minikube image load academic-platform-authservice:latest
minikube image load academic-platform-studentservice:latest
minikube image load academic-platform-attendanceservice:latest
minikube image load academic-platform-assignmentservice:latest
minikube image load academic-platform-notificationservice:latest
minikube image load academic-platform-bff:latest

# Deploy all services
kubectl apply -f k8s/namespace.yaml
kubectl apply -f k8s/databases/
kubectl apply -f k8s/rabbitmq/
kubectl apply -f k8s/services/

# Verify all pods are running
kubectl get pods -n academic

# Get the application URL
minikube service bff -n academic --url

Internal DNS Communication

Services communicate via Kubernetes internal DNS — no IP addresses:

authservice    → jdbc:postgresql://authdb:5432/authdb
studentservice → jdbc:postgresql://studentdb:5432/studentdb
bff            → http://auth-service:8081
bff            → http://student-service:8082
attendanceservice → rabbitmq:5672

Update images in Kubernetes

# Tag new version
docker tag academic-platform-bff:latest academic-platform-bff:v2
minikube image load academic-platform-bff:v2

# Update yaml image tag and apply
kubectl apply -f k8s/services/bff.yaml

# Restart all deployments
kubectl rollout restart deployment -n academic
kubectl get pods -n academic --watch

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API Endpoints

All requests go through BFF on port 8080. JWT token required in Authorization: Bearer <token> header for all endpoints except auth.

Auth

POST /api/auth/register   — Register new user
POST /api/auth/login      — Login, returns JWT token

Students

POST   /api/students                        — Create student profile
GET    /api/students/{id}                   — Get student
GET    /api/students/teacher/{teacherId}    — Get teacher's students
PUT    /api/students/{id}                   — Update student
DELETE /api/students/{id}                   — Delete student

Attendance

POST /api/attendance                              — Record attendance
GET  /api/attendance/student/{id}                 — Get student attendance
GET  /api/attendance/student/{id}/stats           — Get attendance statistics

Assignments

POST /api/assignments           — Create assignment (single student)
POST /api/assignments/all       — Create assignment for all students
GET  /api/assignments/{id}      — Get assignment
GET  /api/assignments/student/{studentId}  — Get student assignments
GET  /api/assignments/teacher/{teacherId}  — Get teacher assignments
PUT  /api/assignments/{id}/grade   — Grade assignment
PUT  /api/assignments/{id}/submit  — Submit assignment

Notifications

GET /api/notifications/student/{id}   — Get student notifications
GET /api/notifications/recent         — Get recent notifications

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Project Structure

academic-platform/
├── auth-service/           — JWT auth, user registration
├── studentservice/         — Student profiles, gRPC server
├── attendanceservice/      — Attendance tracking, warning events
├── assignmentservice/      — Assignments, grading, events
├── notificationservice/    — Email notifications, event consumer
├── bff/                    — API gateway, JWT validation, Thymeleaf UI
│   └── src/main/resources/
│       └── templates/      — HTML pages (Thymeleaf)
├── proto/                  — Shared gRPC contract definitions
├── k8s/                    — Kubernetes manifests
│   ├── namespace.yaml
│   ├── databases/
│   ├── rabbitmq/
│   └── services/
└── docker-compose.yml      — Local development setup

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Security

• JWT tokens validated on every request at BFF level
• Passwords hashed with BCrypt
• Internal services not exposed outside Docker/Kubernetes network
• Services communicate via internal DNS only
• Role-based access: TEACHER and STUDENT roles