RETEC — Portfolio

Personal portfolio website for RETEC, built with Flask. Features an admin dashboard, project showcase, blog, testimonials, analytics, and a black-and-white editorial design.

Stack

• Backend: Python, Flask, SQLAlchemy, SQLite (dev) / PostgreSQL (prod)
• Frontend: Jinja2 templates, vanilla CSS, vanilla JS
• Icons: Font Awesome 6
• Typography: Inter + DM Serif Display

Features

• Portfolio project showcase with GitHub API fallback
• Blog with admin CRUD, slugs, and HTML content
• Testimonial management
• Analytics (page views, section interest tracking)
• Fun fact ticker (floating bottom-left)
• WhatsApp contact button (floating bottom-right)
• Contact form with spam protection (honeypot + rate limiting)
• Enquiry tracking: submissions stored and listed at /admin/enquiries, exportable as CSV
• Contact alerts by email with a cumulative enquiry CSV attached (Brevo)
• SMTP email support
• CV page
• Category-based project filtering
• SEO meta tags + Open Graph
• Page transition animations
• Admin panel at /admin

Local Setup

pip install -r requirements.txt
cp .env.example .env
# Set SECRET_KEY, INITIAL_ADMIN_USERNAME, and a 12+ character INITIAL_ADMIN_PASSWORD in .env
python app.py

The app runs on http://localhost:5000. The first admin account is created only when INITIAL_ADMIN_USERNAME and INITIAL_ADMIN_PASSWORD are configured; existing admin accounts are not changed.

Deploy (Render)

1. Push this repo to GitHub
2. On Render: New > Web Service → connect repo
3. Build Command: pip install -r requirements.txt
4. Start Command: gunicorn app:app
5. Add a Render PostgreSQL database and set DATABASE_URL env var
6. Set SECRET_KEY, INITIAL_ADMIN_USERNAME, and INITIAL_ADMIN_PASSWORD env vars
7. Set RATELIMIT_STORAGE_URI to a shared Redis URL for limits across workers
8. Deploy

Environment Variables

Variable	Description
DATABASE_URL	PostgreSQL connection string (Render)
SECRET_KEY	Flask session secret key
INITIAL_ADMIN_USERNAME	Username for the first admin account on an empty database
INITIAL_ADMIN_PASSWORD	First admin password; must be at least 12 characters
RATELIMIT_STORAGE_URI	Flask-Limiter storage URL; use shared Redis in production
MAIL_SERVER	SMTP server (optional)
MAIL_PORT	SMTP port (default 587)
MAIL_USE_TLS	Use STARTTLS, usually true for port 587
MAIL_USE_SSL	Use SMTP SSL, usually true for port 465
MAIL_USERNAME	SMTP username
MAIL_PASSWORD	SMTP password
MAIL_FROM	Sender email address
MAIL_TO	Contact form recipient
BREVO_API_KEY	Brevo API key for contact alerts
SMS_NOTIFY_TO	Unused. SMS alerts were replaced by the CSV-attachment email

Enquiries

Every contact form submission is stored in the enquiry table and listed at /admin/enquiries, with the full project message one click away. The same data is available as CSV from /admin/enquiries/export.csv.

Each new enquiry also emails MAIL_TO with a cumulative CSV attached (retec-enquiries-YYYY-MM-DD.csv) containing every enquiry received so far, so the dataset is always recoverable from your inbox. This replaced the previous SMS alert; send_sms_notification() is kept in app.py but is no longer called.

SMTP Setup

Copy .env.example to .env, then fill in your provider details. For Gmail, enable 2-Step Verification and create an App Password. Use:

MAIL_SERVER=smtp.gmail.com
MAIL_PORT=587
MAIL_USE_TLS=true
MAIL_USE_SSL=false
MAIL_USERNAME=your-email@gmail.com
MAIL_PASSWORD=your-google-app-password
MAIL_FROM=your-email@gmail.com
MAIL_TO=contact.retec@gmail.com