Note: This project is now archived. Content can be found at https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/opportunity/web-literacy/

Learning.mozilla.org

This is the source code for learning.mozilla.org, using learning.mofostaging.net as staging server.

For a summary of the most recent changes to the project, please see CHANGELOG.md. It's awesome.

Overview

This software consists of two major parts:

• A Server-side Node.js library that is used by app.js to generate static page HTML for pages bound to specific URLs.
• Client-side JavaScript code that runs the site as an app in the user's browser, taking care of (virtual) routing and page loads after the initial server response for the URL the user first started using our site on.

Get started

Dependencies

To get a local version of the site running, you'll need to have git and node installed on your local machine.

Clone

In order to contribute to this project, you'll need to create your own fork of it and make pull-requests against our master branch.

Clone from your own fork or from the original:

git clone https://github.com/mozilla/learning.mozilla.org.git
cd learning.mozilla.org

Build and Develop

To start developing, all you need to do is run the following in the learning.mozilla.org directory you just created:

$> npm install
$> npm start

The first command installs all the dependencies for Node.js to do its thing, and the second command runs a compile for the server and client code, while also starting a local server on http://localhost:8008, with the compiles running in watch` mode, so that any changes you make to files result in the updated code getting bundled in.

Note that this is not the same as hot-reloading: you still need to manuall reload your browser window/tab to see the effects of your code updates.

A note about source maps

Because this project uses a variety of tools that transform the original source code before delivering it to the browser, it is critical for source maps to work properly in order to ensure a pleasant developer experience.

However, due to the unfortunate realities of software development, there isn't a "one size fits all" solution to this. Please be sure to read the Environment Variables section below and configure your environment as needed to ensure that you're seeing useful line numbers for whatever part of the codebase you need to change.

Directory and naming conventions

JS

• lib/: Non-react modules, as well as entry-point modules for the client and server bundles.
• components/: Re-usable react components that can be used throughout the site
• pages/: React "page" components, i.e. top-level pages required by lib/router
• hoc/: React higher-order components

Less

• less/: This is where you should add styles. common.less is the entry-point.

Other

• img/: For images
• build/: used as a staging area for the server bundle This folder is gitignored, do not edit files here.
• dist/: Generated site assets goes here. This folder is gitignored, do not edit files here.

Localization

Work in progress, but please read the documentation on how we are doing it for the site here.

Test

The code currently only comes with linting, which runs automatically as part of the webpack compile.

Environment Variables

The following environment variables can be used to modify how the software works.

Name	Description
NODE_ENV	set this to production to automatically minify code and remove various development-only affordances.
SHOW_DEV_RIBBON	set this to on to show the "dev version" ribbon even when NODE_ENV is set to production. This can be used on staging sites.
WEBPACK_DEVTOOL	determines the setting for the devtool Webpack option. In development, it defaults to eval, while in production it defaults to source-map. For more details on the trade-offs between different options, see our conversation on sourcemaps.
LESS_AUTOPREFIXER	set this to off to disable the LESS autoprefixer and enable useful CSS source maps, which is a workaround for #413.
ORIGIN	is the domain name of which the site is hosted. This is used in situations where absolute URLs are required, such as generating a sitemap.xml file.
MAPBOX_ACCESS_TOKEN	is the Mapbox access token to use for embedded maps in the website. Optional.
MAPBOX_MAP_ID	is the Mapbox map ID to use for embedded maps in the website. Optional.
TEACH_API_URL	is the origin of the Teach API server. Defaults to https://teach-api.herokuapp.com.
GA_ACCOUNT	is the property ID of the Google Analytics account. E.g. UA-123.... It defaults to the property ID for the Teach site. Set it to DISABLED to disable Google Analytics entirely.
GA_DEBUG	When set to 'on' will output verbose info to the console about what data is being sent to Google Analytics.
NEWSLETTER_MAILINGLIST_URL	is the newsletter signup form destination. If undefined, newsletter signup is simulated for development purposes.
HIDE_NEWSLETTER_SIGNUP_FORM	is the flag to hide/show newsletter signup form on the site.
PORT	is the port to serve the experimental lightweight dynamic server on. Defaults to 8008.
OPTIMIZELY_ID	Optimizely Project ID (not a secret) e.g. '206878104'
OPTIMIZELY_ACTIVE	If set to 'yes' (String) the project will include Optimizely snippet in the page load
MAKE_METADATA_URL	The template source url to load users' Makes metadata. Username should be included in the URL as a variable. e.g., https://{username}.makes.org/makes.json
WORDPRESS_DOMAIN	The domain to the wordpress.com site this app retrieves data from. e.g., helloworld.wordpress.com (with no protocol),
supportedLocales	enables specific locales, for example: ['en-US', 'id'] will only enable 2 locales. Default value is * which will enable all locales under locales directory.
LOGIN_EMULATION	determines whether or not the teach-api is used for login state management. defaults to false.
LOGIN_EMULATION_LOGGEDOUT	determines whether, when login emulation is on, the login state should be logged in or out. defaults to false.
LOGIN_EMULATION_USERNAME	determines the username that is used when login emulation is on and login status is not set to logged out. defaults to 'testuser'.
FULL_SUBDOMAIN_FOR_COOKIE	A domain string, used by Optimizely to determine cookie domain that is used by Optimizely. defaults to 'learning.mozilla.org'
ENABLE_PONTOON	set this to on to inject the Pontoon client-side localization script.
CREDLY_BASE_URL	The main url that you can access the Credly interface through. Defaults to https://staging.credly.com.

Using Environment Variables in Local Development

Create a file called .env in the root of your project, and then add all the environment variables you need into this using the following format:

export GA_ACCOUNT='xxxxxxx'
export TEACH_API_URL='xxxxxxx'

Feature Flags

These are environment variables that turn on experimental features that need to be tested in a staging environment but should not show up on a production deploy. These flags need to explicitly be set for the feature to show up.

The current list of feature flags is:

Name	If set, enables...
ENABLE_BADGES	rendering the /badges and /badge/.... routes, and reveals the badge main page as a sidebar navigation option.

Content Security Policies

If you run into CORS or CSP issues (blocked domains trying to GET or POST, loading external scripts like X-Ray Goggles, etc) then you probably want to make sure that the Content Security Policy is set to clear whatever it is you need cleared.

We handle this in app.js, in the helmet.contentSecurityPolicy block. Typically you'll care about the connectSrc block for remote content fetching, and the scriptSrc block for injecting/loading external scripts, although you might have CSP needs outside those two categories: all of the major CSP categories have their own section and should be readily identifiable.

References

• Roadmap
• Change Log
• Contribution Guidelines