Context

Time Trial Cards - Web Platform is the server-side component of the Time Trial Cards educational project. It provides teachers and administrators with a web dashboard to organize educational content, launch game sessions, and analyze student results. The platform communicates directly with the Time Trial Cards Unity game through a stateless REST API.

Architecture

The application follows a strict layered architecture:

• Thin Controllers - validate input, delegate to services, return JSON or Blade responses
• Services containing all business logic, implementing typed PHP interfaces for dependency injection and testability
• Managers handling cross-cutting operations spanning multiple services (e.g., creating a user with their teacher profile in a single database transaction)
• Eloquent Models representing database entities with bilingual accessors and defined relationships

Contributions

REST API for the Unity Client

Design and implementation of unauthenticated public endpoints enabling the Unity game to interact with the platform to join sessions, verify their status, and submit game results.

Docker Environment

Set up a Docker Compose stack for local development, where none previously existed, allowing any developer to run the full application locally with a single command.

Deployment Automation

Created a Makefile automating production releases to o2switch shared hosting via SSH in a single command.

GitHub Copilot Configuration

Set up GitHub Copilot configuration files (instructions, skills, agents) to streamline AI-assisted development on the project.