Welcome to QuizMaker backend! This Spring Boot application powers a flexible, secure, and future-proof quiz platform with JSON-based question storage, audit trails, role management, and more.
QuizMaker lets you create, manage, and deliver quizzes with ease. On the backend, we:
- Store question definitions in MySQL using the native
JSONcolumn type for flexibility - Never expose correct answers to the frontend—grading happens securely on the server
- Track every user’s answers and quiz results in dedicated tables
- Manage user roles via a many-to-many mapping
- Keep audit logs and soft-delete records for compliance and recovery
- Provide hooks for spaced repetition, analytics, ratings, comments, notifications, and more
- Language: Java 17
- Framework: Spring Boot 3.x (Spring Data JPA, Spring Security)
- Database: MySQL 8+ with native JSON columns
- Migration: Flyway or Liquibase
- Build: Maven
- Security: JWT-based authentication, BCrypt password hashing, role-based access control
- Java 17 SDK
- Maven 3.6+
- MySQL 8+ (or Docker container)
- (Optional) Docker & Docker Compose for local DB and test containers
-
Clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/your-org/quizmaker.git cd quizmaker -
Configure environment variables
SPRING_DATASOURCE_URL=jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/quizdb SPRING_DATASOURCE_USERNAME=quizuser SPRING_DATASOURCE_PASSWORD=secret JWT_SECRET=your_jwt_signing_secret -
Run database migrations
mvn flyway:migrate -
Start the application
mvn spring-boot:run
The API will be available at http://localhost:8080/api.
Below is a high-level summary of the core tables. For full DDL and examples, see the migration scripts in
src/main/resources/db/migration.
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
| users | Stores user credentials, audit flags, soft deletes |
| roles | Enumerated roles: Admin, Moderator, Editor, User |
| user_roles | Many-to-many mapping between users and roles |
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
| quizzes | Quiz metadata: title, visibility, difficulty, timers |
| categories | Category lookup for quizzes |
| tags | Tag lookup for free-form labeling |
| quiz_tags | Many-to-many mapping between quizzes and tags |
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
| questions | Stores each question; content is a JSON blob for MCQs, open text, hotspots, etc. |
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
| user_answers | Logs every answer attempt (JSON for submitted data) |
| user_quiz_results | Aggregates per-quiz results: scores, durations, spaced repetition info |
| Table | P 62B7 urpose |
|---|---|
| quiz_ratings | Star ratings and optional comments |
| comments | Free-form user comments on quizzes |
| followers | Follow users or quizzes for updates |
| Table | Purpose |
|---|---|
| notifications | Scheduled or real-time messages to users |
| audit_logs | Records of CRUD actions, logins, role changes |
All tables include is_deleted + deleted_at for soft deletes, plus created_at and updated_at timestamps for
audit readiness.
We use JUnit 5, Mockito, and Testcontainers:
mvn test
Integration tests will spin up a disposable MySQL container and run through key API flows.
- Fork the repository
- Create a feature branch
- Commit your changes
- Push and open a Pull Request
Please follow our code style guidelines and write tests for new functionality.
This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.
Happy quizzing! 🎉