ReporterDay

ReporterDay is a layered ASP.NET Core MVC blog/news platform. It includes article publishing, category and slider management, author flows, user registration/login with ASP.NET Core Identity, comments, slug-based article URLs, protected article identifiers, and AI-assisted comment moderation with Hugging Face.

This project is a stronger portfolio piece because it demonstrates multi-layered .NET architecture, EF Core, Identity, validation, data access abstractions, ViewComponents, and external AI service integration.

Features

• Public blog/news homepage
• Article listing and article detail pages
• Slug-based article URLs
• Category management
• Slider management
• Author article creation flow
• User registration and login with ASP.NET Core Identity
• Comment system
• Comment moderation with blocked words
• Optional Hugging Face toxicity model integration
• Memory cache for moderation responses
• Protected article IDs with ASP.NET Core Data Protection
• ViewComponent-based page composition
• FluentValidation-based validation rules
• Layered architecture with Entity, Data Access, Business, and Presentation layers

Tech Stack

• ASP.NET Core MVC 8.0
• C#
• Entity Framework Core 8
• SQL Server
• ASP.NET Core Identity
• Razor Views
• ViewComponents
• FluentValidation
• MemoryCache
• HttpClient
• Hugging Face inference API integration
• Data Protection API
• Bootstrap / ZenBlog template

Solution Structure

ReporterDay/
├── ReporterDay.sln
├── ReporterDay.EntityLayer/
│   └── Entities/
├── ReporterDay.DataAccessLayer/
│   ├── Context/
│   ├── EntityFramework/
│   ├── Migrations/
│   └── Repositories/
├── BusinessLayer/
│   ├── Abstract/
│   ├── Concrete/
│   ├── Models/
│   └── ValidationRules/
├── ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/
│   ├── Controllers/
│   ├── Models/
│   ├── Security/
│   ├── ViewComponents/
│   ├── Views/
│   ├── Program.cs
│   └── appsettings.json
└── README.md

Requirements

Before running the project, make sure the following tools are installed:

• .NET 8 SDK
• SQL Server, SQL Server Express, LocalDB, or SQL Server running in Docker
• Visual Studio 2022 or Visual Studio Code
• EF Core CLI tools

Install EF Core CLI tools if they are not already installed:

dotnet tool install --global dotnet-ef

If the tool is already installed, update it:

dotnet tool update --global dotnet-ef

Database Setup

The project uses SQL Server with EF Core migrations.

The database connection is read from:

ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/appsettings.json

Default local configuration:

"ConnectionStrings": {
  "DefaultConnection": "Server=localhost;Database=ReporterBlogDayDb;Trusted_Connection=True;TrustServerCertificate=True;"
}

For team or production-like usage, keep machine-specific values out of source control and override the connection string with user secrets:

dotnet user-secrets init --project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

dotnet user-secrets set "ConnectionStrings:DefaultConnection" "Server=localhost;Database=ReporterBlogDayDb;Trusted_Connection=True;TrustServerCertificate=True;" --project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

If you use SQL Server in Docker, use a SQL authentication connection string instead:

dotnet user-secrets set "ConnectionStrings:DefaultConnection" "Server=localhost,1433;Database=ReporterBlogDayDb;User Id=sa;Password=Your_password123;TrustServerCertificate=True;" --project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

Apply migrations:

dotnet ef database update --project ReporterDay.DataAccessLayer/ReporterDay.DataAccessLayer.csproj --startup-project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

This creates the ReporterBlogDayDb database and required tables for articles, categories, comments, sliders, tags, and Identity users.

Optional AI Moderation Setup

The project supports optional Hugging Face-based toxicity detection for comments.

Default model settings are located in:

ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/appsettings.json

The API token should not be committed to the repository. Use user secrets:

dotnet user-secrets set "HuggingFace:ApiToken" "your-huggingface-token" --project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

If no token is configured, the moderation service reports the model as unavailable. The project also supports blocked-word moderation through CommentModeration:BlockedWords.

How to Run

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/FatmaBuseBorlu/ReporterDay.git

Navigate into the project folder:

cd ReporterDay

Restore dependencies:

dotnet restore

Apply database migrations:

dotnet ef database update --project ReporterDay.DataAccessLayer/ReporterDay.DataAccessLayer.csproj --startup-project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

Run the application:

dotnet run --project ReporterDay.PresentationLayer/ReporterDay.PresentationLayer.csproj

Open the application in your browser using the localhost URL shown in the terminal.

Main Routes

/Default/Index              Public homepage
/Article/ArticleDetail      Article detail page
/Register/CreateUser        User registration
/Login/UserLogin            User login
/Author/CreateArticle       Author article creation
/Author/MyArticleList       Author article list
/Category/CategoryList      Category management
/Slider/SliderList          Slider management

In development mode, there are also diagnostic endpoints:

/test-config    Shows whether Hugging Face token/config exists
/test-tox       Tests toxicity model integration
/_endpoints     Lists mapped endpoints

What I Practiced

• Layered architecture in ASP.NET Core
• Entity Framework Core with SQL Server
• ASP.NET Core Identity integration
• Repository and service abstractions
• FluentValidation validation rules
• Article/category/comment domain modeling
• Slug generation for readable URLs
• ASP.NET Core Data Protection for ID handling
• ViewComponent-based UI composition
• AI-assisted comment moderation
• External API integration with HttpClient
• MemoryCache usage for repeated moderation checks
• Environment-based configuration with appsettings.json and user secrets

Future Improvements

• Add role-based admin authorization
• Add seed data for categories, sliders, and sample articles
• Add pagination and search for article lists
• Add image upload support for articles
• Add unit/integration tests
• Add Docker Compose for SQL Server and the web app
• Add GitHub Actions CI workflow
• Add screenshots to the README

Repository

GitHub: https://github.com/FatmaBuseBorlu/ReporterDay