OnboardX

Smart community onboarding and mentorship engine, built for the Airtel NextGen Cohort Knowledge Showcase 2.0. Full context and rationale is in PRD-Community-Onboarding-Engine.md.

Live app: https://onboardx-ashy.vercel.app

New members joining a campus tech community (MSA, GDG, etc.) sign up, fill in a short intake form, and get an AI-generated 4-week starter learning path routed only through a hand-verified curriculum (the AI never invents links). They're automatically matched with a senior mentor who has real capacity -- if every matching mentor is full, the learner is honestly routed to a Self-Guided + AI track instead of being forced onto an unrelated mentor. Weekly check-ins generate a shareable "shoutout" message members post back into the community's existing WhatsApp group, making progress visible to everyone, not just the mentor and mentee.

What's actually built

• Auth: real Firebase email/password signup and login, with role selection (learner or mentor) and a public landing page for new visitors
• AI-generated learning paths: Azure OpenAI acts strictly as a router over a verified curriculum list (10 skill areas: web dev, Python, cloud, data, AI/ML, UI/UX, Android, cybersecurity, DevOps, backend) -- it can never hallucinate a broken link, and honestly falls back to a general catalog page for topics outside that list
• Mentor matching with capacity caps: a hard 3-mentee cap per mentor, enforced with a Firestore transaction to prevent race conditions when two learners match at once; learners with no capacity available anywhere are routed to a Self-Guided + AI track, not randomly assigned
• Automatic rematching: when a mentee graduates, their mentor's seat frees up immediately, and the longest-waiting Self-Guided learner in that specialty is automatically matched -- event-triggered, not a polling job
• Mentor consent gating: a learner can't message their mentor via WhatsApp until the mentor has actually accepted the request
• Weekly check-ins: Done / Stuck / Skipped, each tracked distinctly; a stuck mentee is flagged on their mentor's dashboard with a one-tap WhatsApp nudge already written
• Path completion: after 4 weeks, a learner chooses a deeper Intermediate path or a Peer Study Group -- not immediate mentor status
• Admin view: real-time cohort status, a single "copy weekly reminder" message meant for the community group (not mass-DMing), and a "needs attention" section highlighting stuck learners with a direct WhatsApp link to their mentor
• Mentor request timeout: a learner can switch to Self-Guided if their mentor hasn't responded in 48 hours, rather than waiting indefinitely

Project structure

onboardx/
  frontend/    React + Vite + Tailwind, deployed on Vercel
  backend/     Node + Express + Firebase Admin + Azure OpenAI, deployed on Azure App Service

Setup

1. Firebase project

1. Create a project at https://console.firebase.google.com
2. Enable Authentication (Email/Password) and Firestore Database
3. Add a web app, copy the config values into frontend/.env (copy from .env.example)
4. Go to Project Settings > Service Accounts > Generate new private key, save the file as backend/service-account.json

2. Azure OpenAI (via AI Foundry)

1. In https://ai.azure.com, deploy a model (gpt-4o-mini recommended) and note its deployment name
2. On the deployment page, copy the endpoint, API key, and API version
3. Add all four to backend/.env (AZURE_OPENAI_ENDPOINT, AZURE_OPENAI_API_KEY, AZURE_OPENAI_DEPLOYMENT, AZURE_OPENAI_API_VERSION)
4. Check the deployment's quota (tokens/minute) on that same page -- if it's 0, request an increase or redeploy in a different region

3. Install and run

# backend
cd backend
cp .env.example .env   # fill in Azure OpenAI and Firebase values
npm install
npm run dev             # runs on http://localhost:4000

# frontend (separate terminal)
cd frontend
cp .env.example .env    # fill in Firebase config + VITE_API_BASE_URL
npm install
npm run dev              # runs on http://localhost:5173

4. Seed at least one mentor

Sign up through the app itself with role "Mentor" -- this creates a proper mentorProfiles document automatically, including the specialty and phone number needed for matching and WhatsApp handoff.

Routes (backend)

Route	Purpose
POST /api/generate-plan	Intake text -> AI-routed 4-week starter plan
POST /api/match	Capacity-aware mentor matching with transaction safety, falls back to Self-Guided + AI
POST /api/cancel-pending-match	Lets a learner switch to Self-Guided if their mentor hasn't responded
POST /api/checkin	Submits a weekly check-in, returns a shareable shoutout, triggers rematch on graduation
POST /api/generate-next-plan	Generates the next 4-week plan after path completion
POST /api/join-study-group	Groups a learner into a peer study group by interest topic

Deployment

• Frontend: Vercel, auto-deploys from main
• Backend: Azure App Service, deployed from main
• Firebase Authentication requires the deployed domain added under Authentication > Settings > Authorized domains

Known limitations (disclosed, not hidden)

• Admin access is gated by an email allowlist checked client-side -- good enough to hide the view from regular users, not a substitute for real Firestore Security Rules at production scale
• No in-app chat by design -- WhatsApp deep links are used instead, since that's where these communities already communicate
• Rematching picks the longest-waiting Self-Guided learner for a given specialty, not a globally optimal assignment across all open seats