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Session 13: Milestone project work day 1

Phase 8 — Flask · Session 13 of 14

What we’re learning today

Today is your day. You’ll plan a full-stack web app — your design, your data, your users — and start building it. Next week you finish, deploy, and demo your live URL to the class. This is your eighth and final milestone of the curriculum.

You’ll need to remember from last time

  • Templates — extends/block, partials.
  • Database — get_db, CRUD, parameterized queries.
  • Auth — signup, login, hashed passwords, current_user.
  • Forms — POST-Redirect-GET, validation.
  • Flash messages for feedback.
  • Deployment — PythonAnywhere.

Part A: Plan your project

The plan

Take paper or open a blank text file. Answer these nine questions:

  1. What’s the app? (One sentence. “A recipe-sharing site.” “A polling app.” “A reading log.”)

  2. Who’s it for? (Yourself? Class? General public?)

  3. Does it need user accounts? (Almost always yes for Phase 8 milestones.)

  4. What does each user do? (Sign up, log in, then… what?)

  5. What database tables? (users plus what? Each table: name + columns.)

  6. What routes? (Each URL + what it does. At minimum: home, signup, login, logout, list, create, view, edit, delete.)

  7. What templates? (One per route, usually.)

  8. What’s the simplest version? (Build this FIRST. No fancy features. Just core flow.)

  9. What’s one stretch feature? (After core works.)

Phase 8 requirements

Your milestone must:

  • Use HTML + CSS + Python (Flask).
  • Have user accounts (signup, login, logout with hashed passwords).
  • Have a database with at least 2 tables (users + one other).
  • Have full CRUD for at least one entity (create, read, update, delete).
  • Be deployed to a public URL by the demo — PythonAnywhere or another host.
  • Be usable by multiple users — your classmates should be able to sign up and use it.

Bonus:

  • Extra tables / relationships.
  • Search / filter.
  • Public + private content.
  • File uploads.
  • API endpoints (JSON returns).
  • Real CSS polish.

If you don’t have an idea

Pick one and modify:

Personal apps (your data only):

  • Reading log — track books, ratings, reviews.
  • Habit tracker — daily check-in for habits.
  • Goal tracker — long-term goals with progress.
  • Workout log — exercises, sets, dates.
  • Movie / show watchlist — to-watch and watched.
  • Recipe collection — categorized, with ingredients.
  • Quote collection — favorite quotes by source.
  • Daily journal — date-tagged entries.

Multi-user apps (community):

  • Class profile site — each kid has a card with their interests.
  • Class wiki — shared editable pages.
  • Recipe sharing — submit and browse others’ recipes.
  • Book club — vote on next book, discuss.
  • Polls / voting — create polls, vote, see results.
  • Q&A site — ask questions, others answer.
  • Photo gallery with comments.
  • Trivia game — questions, scores per user, leaderboard.

Game / interactive apps:

  • Multi-user trivia with high scores per user.
  • Word game — guess the word, score per user.
  • Memory game with persistent best times.
  • Choose-your-own-adventure with saved progress.

Tools / productivity:

  • Group todo list — shared, multi-user permissions.
  • Class scheduler — assignments + due dates.
  • Note-taking (extension of Sessions 10-11).
  • Bookmark manager — save URLs with tags.
  • Pomodoro / time tracker with stats.

Variants of in-class projects:

  • The notes app from Sessions 10-11 with new features (tags, search, public mode, sharing).
  • A guestbook (Session 5/8) + accounts so posters are users.

Pick one. Spend two minutes. Don’t overthink.

Show Mr. Eric

When your plan is ready, show it to Mr. Eric. He’ll either say “go build it” or ask one question.

Set up the project + deploy day 1

$ mkdir my_app && cd my_app
$ touch app.py
$ git init
$ git add app.py
$ git commit -m "Initial setup"

Push to GitHub:

  1. Create a new public repo on GitHub.
  2. git remote add origin ... + git push -u origin main.

Then deploy to PythonAnywhere right now, before any real code:

  1. PythonAnywhere bash console: git clone your repo.
  2. Add a new web app (Manual config, Python 3.10).
  3. Edit WSGI file.
  4. pip install --user flask.
  5. Reload.
  6. Visit URL — should show some kind of error (no code yet) or “Hello world” if you wrote one.

Why deploy day 1? Same reason as Phase 7 Session 16: catch deployment issues now, not the night before demo. Every commit can be deployed via git pull + Reload.

Build the simplest version first

Look at your answer to question 8. Build that first. Get a window on screen — even just signup

  • login working. Then iterate.

For each significant change:

  1. Make the change locally.
  2. Test in browser at 127.0.0.1:5000.
  3. Commit + push.
  4. PythonAnywhere bash: cd my_app && git pull.
  5. PythonAnywhere web tab: Reload.
  6. Verify on the public URL.

This is the real deploy loop. Do it for every significant change.

Use what you’ve learned

  • Auth from Session 9.
  • Multi-table database from Sessions 10-11.
  • Templates with extends from Session 4.
  • Forms with POST-Redirect-GET from Session 5.
  • Flash messages from Session 6.
  • Per-user data isolation with WHERE user_id = ? from Sessions 10-11.

The complete patterns are in Sessions 1-12.

Wrap-up

Last 5 minutes: each of you, in one sentence, share your project idea + your live URL. (URL might just show “Hello world” right now — that’s OK.)

Bring your project (code + URL) next week. We’ll finish, then demo.

If you got far, commit, push, pull, reload before next week so the public URL is current.

If you missed this session

Open Thonny and a terminal.

  1. Spend 10-15 minutes answering the nine planning questions.

  2. Set up your project + GitHub + PythonAnywhere.

  3. Build the simplest version (signup + login at minimum).

  4. Push and deploy.

About 90-120 minutes total. By next week:

  • Working signup and login at a public URL.
  • At least one feature beyond auth (e.g., a list of items the user has created).
  • Several Git commits.
  • The deploy loop comfortable.

If you don’t have an idea, the seed list is your starting point.

Stretch and extension ideas

If your base is working and you want to add more:

  • Real CSS polish (Phase 7 callback).
  • Mobile-responsive design.
  • Search / filter for your data.
  • Public + private modes for content.
  • Multiple data types / tables — relationships.
  • Image uploads.
  • API endpoints that return JSON.
  • Email notifications (advanced).
  • README with screenshots.
  • Cross-link from your Phase 7 homepage — unified portfolio.

What’s next

Next week is the last session of the entire curriculum. You’ll finish, polish, deploy your final version, and demo to the class.

Bring your laptop. Bring your URL. Bring your enthusiasm. Last big climb.