PlaceFinder

PlaceFinder is a Golang-based web application designed to index, search, and display information about various places using Elasticsearch. The application provides a simple HTML interface to browse places and a JSON API for programmatic access, along with JWT authentication for secure API access. This project was developed as a part of School 21 curriculum.

Description

PlaceFinder is designed to index a large dataset of places (such as restaurants) into Elasticsearch and provide an easy-to-use interface to browse and search through them. The project demonstrates the integration of Golang with Elasticsearch for full-text search capabilities and provides a simple HTML interface for viewing the data, along with a JSON API for accessing the data programmatically.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have met the following requirements:

• Golang v 1.21
• Elasticsearch v 8.13
• Taskfile v3.37

Usage

1. Add Elasticsearch directory to the Taskfile (vars:es_dir)

2. Start Elasticsearch

   task start-es

3. In a separate terminal, build the application

   task build

4. If you are running the app for the first time, you need to setup the database:

   ./PlaceFinder -s

   curl -XPUT -H "Content-Type: application/json" "http://localhost:9200/places/_settings" -d '{ "index" : { "max_result_window" : 20000 }}'

5. Run the app and see search results via browser or curl

   • HTML interface http://localhost:8888
   • API interface http://localhost:8888/api/places?page=1
   • Recommendations http://localhost:8888/api/recommend?lat=55.797129&lon=37.579789

6. To enable authentication, run the app with flag -a:

   ./PlaceFinder -a

   Obtain a JWT token http://localhost:8888/api/get_token

   Get recommendations via curl

   curl -X GET -H "Authorization: Bearer your.token.here" http://localhost:8888/api/recommend?lat=55.797129&lon=37.579789