BL-751-BE-Build an Email Service by lisamdespain · Pull Request #124 · BloomTech-Labs/coder-heroes-be

lisamdespain · 2022-09-13T16:31:25Z

Description

Owner: Lisa DeSpain, Co-owners: Renee Troiani and Colya Foxworth
The goal was to create an email service using SendGrid's API. First, we had to determine the stakeholder's needs. When would an email need to automatically go out? How could we use the backend to enable automatic email delivery, with customization? We decided to use the email service to send automated emails when the profile was created to different user types: instructors, parents, and students. Within profileRouter.js post function, we used conditional logic to send a request to the sendEmail function in the emailHelper.js file. We used a different SendGrid template for each of the types of users. Part 2 of this was to add that new email and contact name to a contact list on SendGrid. We did that in profileRouter.js by passing the list_ids to the addToList function in emailHelper.js. Finally, we updated the README file with a roadmap for devs on the Java team.

##Loom:
Loom walkthrough on backend: https://www.loom.com/share/a7d867ee6f9f4bca9a4a3e911bca3de4
Loom how to see if it's working: https://www.loom.com/share/7acaa082c8454ac4bf17e0670aec18d7

Type of change

Please delete options that are not relevant.

[ x ] New feature (non-breaking change which adds functionality)
[ x ] This change requires a documentation update

Checklist:

[x ] My code follows the style guidelines of this project
[x ] I have performed a self-review of my own code
[x ] I have removed unnecessary comments/console logs from my code
[x ] I have made corresponding changes to the documentation if necessary (optional)
[x ] My changes generate no new warnings
[x ] I have checked my code and corrected any misspellings
[x ] No duplicate code left within changed files
[x ] Size of pull request kept to a minimum
[x ] Pull request description clearly describes changes made & motivations for said changes

…is updated, SendGrid installed

ryan-hamblin

@paulstgermain I mentioned to Lisa that we'd be able to grant credit for this work. Even though it won't make it's way into the codebase, this is how I see Spikes playing out in the future via open Draft PR. There are ways to clean up the code here, but I'm more concerned about using this work as a learning platform as we move to rewrite our Backend in Java. @ashtilawat23 take note of the implementation here as it'll be similar in Java but using the Spring/Boot tutorial on Sendgrid's documentation site.

paulstgermain · 2022-09-13T17:20:56Z

@ryan-hamblin Absolutely, that makes sense to me! I'll make sure credit is given for this work now, and I'm sure our Java engineers will be thankful for the leg up this provides!

macrowell70

This is really amazing work. I know a lot of time and effort was put into this, and it really shows. I've left a few minor suggestions in my comments, but overall I am very impressed with what you've accomplished here.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:22:18Z

.gitignore

 .env.local
+sendgrid.env
+sendgrid.env
+sendgrid.env


Should there be three lines with sedgrid.env here?

Nope, removed 2 of them.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:30:24Z

README.md

 <br />
+
+<h2>Email Service</h2>
+In api/email, the emailHelper.js file contains the following functions: sendEmail and addToList. SendEmail sends an API request to SendGrid to send a templated email to the to email address its given. The other function: addToList adds the email and name to a specified SendGrid contact list (they're added to all no matter what, then also to the specified list id). Any function that wants to use sendEmail and addToList will need to import it into their file (see profileRouter.js). Parameters can be passed into it, like the toEmail, name, template_id or list_ids (which is an array so it could have more than 1 list_ids there). The parameters to use are created in the file that's calling the sendEmail function.


Slight typo in the second sentence of this paragraph "SendEmail sends an API request to SendGrid to send a templated email to the to email address it's given." Just have an extra to in there.

Got it - thanks!

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:32:14Z

README.md

+<h2>Email Service</h2>
+In api/email, the emailHelper.js file contains the following functions: sendEmail and addToList. SendEmail sends an API request to SendGrid to send a templated email to the to email address its given. The other function: addToList adds the email and name to a specified SendGrid contact list (they're added to all no matter what, then also to the specified list id). Any function that wants to use sendEmail and addToList will need to import it into their file (see profileRouter.js). Parameters can be passed into it, like the toEmail, name, template_id or list_ids (which is an array so it could have more than 1 list_ids there). The parameters to use are created in the file that's calling the sendEmail function.
+
+SendGrid's npm package info and how to set up the API key (also listed below): https://www.npmjs.com/package/@sendgrid/mail. The npm package is @sendgrid/mail. Very lightweight, highly supported, and heavily downloaded. (SendGrid also supports Java)


Awesome! This is great documentation for people working on this in the future. I am sure they will appreciate how thorough you are.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:37:05Z

README.md

+
+AddToList: First up , add list(s) to the SendGrid account. In addition to the default "all" list, we added instructors, parents, and students. From a marketing perspective, these are the major groups, each requiring a different kind of information, and will potentially need different mass email types.
+
+As part of the request in emailHelper.js, you'll send the id(s) of the contact list (list_ids, an array) you want to add the email to, plus any additional data you want to add to the request, like the email address (as 'email') and name (as 'first_name'). If you use custom fields, make sure the fields are already set up in SendGrid or SG won't know where to map them.


This is fantastic. You've done an excellent job explaining how the process works. I feel like I could set up SendGrid after reading these instructions. Fantastic work.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:39:40Z

__tests__/routes/emailHelper.test.js

+    name: 'New Student Here',
+  },
+  to: 'someperson@somewhere.com',
+  from: 'someperson@somewhere.com', // verified sender in SendGrid account


I am not sure what the comment here is trying to tell me. It may be beneficial to flesh it out a little to make things more clear, or remove it all together if it isn't necessary

Made more clear, also explained domain validation.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:46:12Z

api/email/emailHelper.js

+  sgMail
+    .send(data)
+    .then((response) => {
+      // note: the following 2 console logs are SendGrid out of the box. Keep them if you like them. We found the stringify response to be more descriptive.


I think I would remove the commented out console.logs. If you feel the stringify response is better, then that's what should be used.

That makes sense. I removed them.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:50:37Z

api/profile/profileRouter.js

-    console.error(e);
-    res.status(500).json({ message: e.message });
+  const profileExists = await Profiles.findById(profile.okta_id);
+  if (profileExists) {


Would it be better to put this check for whether the profile exists in the checkProfileObject middleware?

Probably yes, but I didn't want to break existing functionality.

macrowell70 · 2022-09-13T19:52:31Z

api/profile/profileRouter.js

+  if (profileExists) {
+    res.status(400).json({ message: 'profile already exists' });
+  } else {
+    const prof = await Profiles.create(profile);


To me, the variable name "prof" seems a little non-descript and a bit too similar to "profile" used above. I might consider renaming this to "newProfile".

I like that - will do.

lisamdespain added 3 commits September 7, 2022 13:17

initial commit with working email service on profile get by id

64a6a76

profileRouter is sending conditional requests to emailHelper, README …

07cdbb3

…is updated, SendGrid installed

removed a stray console log

7da3efe

lisamdespain requested a review from macrowell70 September 13, 2022 16:31

lisamdespain marked this pull request as draft September 13, 2022 16:39

ryan-hamblin reviewed Sep 13, 2022

View reviewed changes

macrowell70 previously approved these changes Sep 13, 2022

View reviewed changes

Cassius-Cassity and others added 10 commits September 14, 2022 09:02

can now add child under the endpoint /parent

c5b3b6c

Ability for a Parent to update a child profile already built.

9cc2082

testing parent endpoints

d2ba469

parents are now able to get a child based on child id

735ea56

refactored parent model and parent router

e1ff24c

refactored courses model, updated seed file and migration file

ded3275

updated README.md

113ba69

updated README.md

fb3a011

fixed lint error

d9119e9

made recommended changes

bcf8484

lisamdespain dismissed macrowell70’s stale review via bcf8484 September 14, 2022 14:03


		AddToList: First up , add list(s) to the SendGrid account. In addition to the default "all" list, we added instructors, parents, and students. From a marketing perspective, these are the major groups, each requiring a different kind of information, and will potentially need different mass email types.

		As part of the request in emailHelper.js, you'll send the id(s) of the contact list (list_ids, an array) you want to add the email to, plus any additional data you want to add to the request, like the email address (as 'email') and name (as 'first_name'). If you use custom fields, make sure the fields are already set up in SendGrid or SG won't know where to map them.

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lisamdespain commented Sep 13, 2022 •

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