Authors: Sujay Dey, Shrey Jaiswal, E Hemasabari
Abstract: The rapid growth of social media platforms has transformed digital communication, content sharing, and online collaboration. This project presents the development of a full-stack social media application using Spring Boot for the backend, React.js for the frontend, and Cloudinary for cloud-based media storage and management. The system is designed to provide core social networking features such as user authentication, profile management, post creation, image and video uploads, likes, comments, and real-time interaction. Spring Boot is utilized to build secure and scalable RESTful APIs, ensuring efficient handling of business logic and database operations. React.js enables the creation of a responsive and dynamic user interface, enhancing user experience through component-based architecture and state management. Cloudinary is integrated to handle media uploads, storage, and optimization, reducing server load and improving performance. Security mechanisms such as JWT-based authentication and role-based access control are implemented to protect user data and ensure authorized access. The proposed application demonstrates how modern full-stack technologies can be effectively integrated to build a scalable, secure, and user-friendly social media platform. This project highlights practical implementation strategies and serves as a foundation for further enhancements such as real-time notifications, chat functionality, and advanced analytics.
