Clinic Appointment Booking App

About the Application

This project was created as a case study for a master's thesis used to analyze productivity and software quality outcomes in a distributed agile development context.

• Version: 9.2.0 (APP_VERSION in config.php)
• Stack: PHP 8 (PDO/MySQL), Twig, Apache, jQuery/Bootstrap 4, SCSS

How do I get set up?

Docker (recommended)

Requires Docker Desktop with Compose v2+.

docker compose up --build

Open http://localhost:8080/

• Images: php:8.5-apache, mysql:lts, composer:lts (official Docker Hub images)
• First start creates DB clinicAppointmentApp and imports docker/db/init/01-clinicappointmentapp.sql
• App DB user: caba / caba - root: caba_root (local only, change before any shared use)
• Env used by the PHP container: APP_URL, DB_HOST, DB_USER, DB_PASS, DB_NAME (see compose.yaml)
• Stop: docker compose down - add -v to delete the MySQL volume and re-seed next start

Without Docker

• PHP 8.1+ with pdo_mysql, Apache (or equivalent) with mod_rewrite, Composer deps (composer install)
• Create MySQL database clinicAppointmentApp
• Import docker/db/init/01-clinicappointmentapp.sql (or a dump under assets/backups/)
• Set env (or edit config.php): APP_URL, DB_HOST, DB_USER, DB_PASS, DB_NAME
• Default non-Docker APP_URL is http://localhost/caba/ - the vhost path must match that URL (or set APP_URL to your real base). JS reads APP_URL from the page and falls back to http://localhost/caba/ when it is not set.

Seed users in the SQL dump

Roles in DB: 1 receptionist, 2 doctor, 3 patient.

Demo logins from docker/db/init/01-clinicappointmentapp.sql (local only). The password for each account is the username duplicated (admin -> adminadmin, emad -> emademad).

• Receptionist: admin
• Doctors: emad, heba, reem, eman, sameer, omar
• Patients: safaa, saeed, lina, shima, marwa, mazen, ahmed, mohammed

If the MySQL volume already exists from an older seed, recreate it (docker compose down -v then up --build) for these passwords to apply.

SCSS / CSS

• Edit files under scss/, not the generated CSS
• App loads css/style.min.css and css/rtl.min.css (config.php)
• Local rebuild typically goes through gulp (gulpfile.js) / sass, the Docker image does not run a frontend build pipeline (scss/ is dockerignored)

Known problems / incomplete work

• Debug left on: APP_DEBUG is TRUE, Twig debug is on, and display_errors is forced on in config.php (even though the Docker image enables production php.ini).
• Weak auth: passwords stored as MD5 with a static salt (class.user.php).
• Secrets in source: Gmail SMTP credentials in sendEmail.php. AES key hardcoded in backend/functions.php.
• PWA incomplete: service-worker.js is fully commented out. Registration/PWA bits commented in Twig. Referenced manifest.json / Apple touch icons are missing.
• .htaccess host rules: non-localhost hosts are redirected to https://www.…. Awkward for LAN IPs or custom hostnames.
• Seed dump quirks: dump originated as a phpMyAdmin export for techrjfw_cabadb. Includes old session rows and content that may not match a clean install.
• No automated tests and no CI configuration in this repo.
• Composer lock targets older Symfony/Twig minors while Docker runs PHP 8.5. E_DEPRECATED is filtered in config.php so those vendor notices do not flood the UI.
• Docker DB port 3306 published on the host..

Project layout (short)

Path	Purpose
pages/	PHP page entrypoints
backend/	API, classes, DB helpers
templates/	Twig templates
js/, css/, scss/	Front-end assets
uploads/	Runtime uploads (mounted as a volume in Compose)
docker/db/init/	MySQL first-boot SQL
Dockerfile, compose.yaml	Container setup