AreaAlert is a production-ready community reporting platform built with Next.js 16, Express 5, TypeScript, and MongoDB. The application allows residents to report electricity, internet, water, gas, and flood incidents while enabling the community to validate reports through voting and resolution confirmation. The frontend and backend are deployed as independent Vercel applications, with authentication managed by Better Auth and secured using JWT verification through a JWKS endpoint. The platform includes role-based dashboards, advanced filtering, interactive safety maps, MongoDB aggregation-based analytics, secure server actions, and a responsive user experience optimized for both desktop and mobile devices.
Designed a distributed architecture with separate Next.js and Express deployments communicating through authenticated REST APIs
Implemented secure authentication using Better Auth, JWT, and JWKS verification across frontend and backend services
Built a complete community reporting workflow supporting utility outage submissions, voting, and service restoration confirmation
Developed interactive safety maps with district and area visualization, filtering, and severity indicators
Created role-based administration features including user moderation, report management, and platform analytics
Implemented advanced search, filtering, pagination, and historical report analysis for efficient data discovery
Optimized backend analytics using MongoDB aggregation pipelines and the native MongoDB driver without an ORM
Designing secure authentication across independently deployed frontend and backend applications
Building scalable location-based reporting and community verification workflows
Optimizing MongoDB aggregation queries for safety statistics while maintaining responsive dashboard performance
Add real-time outage notifications for affected areas
Introduce AI-assisted duplicate report detection and categorization
Expand interactive mapping with live incident updates and historical trend visualization