Deadline Manager API

Deadline Manager is a RESTful API and backend system built with Java, Spring Boot, Spring Data JPA, and PostgreSQL, designed to help students and professionals efficiently manage both academic and personal deadlines.

At its core, the application enables users to define high-level projects and decompose them into smaller, actionable tasks with their own due dates, estimated effort, and difficulty ratings.

By offering structured support for both project-level planning and task-level execution, this API encourages users to focus on what matters most and stay organized under time pressure.

Table of Contents

• Motivation
• Features
• Tech Stack
• API Endpoints
• File Structure
• Getting Started
• Example Queries
• Future Improvements

Motivation

This project began with a question I asked myself during my programming coursework at UW–Madison: “I’ve been learning Java, but how can I apply it to build something meaningful and relevant outside the classroom?”

That question led me to explore real-world backend development using Spring Boot, a powerful Java framework for building scalable APIs and web applications. I wanted to create something technically challenging that also addressed a problem students often face: managing complex academic workloads.

After considering several ideas, I decided to build an API that helps students manage project deadlines more effectively. The goal was to design a tool that could organize high-level projects while breaking them down into smaller, manageable tasks. In my own experience, this kind of structure improves productivity, reduces procrastination, and makes it easier to maintain momentum throughout the semester.

I'm proud of what this project has become and look forward to expanding it into a full application with a user-friendly frontend in the future.

Features

• Create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) operations for both Projects and Tasks.

• Automatic priority scoring algorithm for projects based on due date, difficulty, and weight.

• Task status management with enum-based validation.

• Filtering and querying projects and tasks by status, due dates, and priorities.

• Consistent global exception handling with meaningful HTTP responses.

• Clean layered architecture separating controller, service, and repository layers.

Tech Stack

• Java 17
• Spring Boot
• Spring Data JPA
• PostgreSQL
• Jakarta Validation

API Endpoints

HTTP Method	Endpoint	Description
POST	/api/v1/projects	Create a new project
GET	/api/v1/projects/{id}	Get a project by ID
PUT	/api/v1/projects/{id}	Update an existing project
PATCH	/api/v1/projects/{id}/status	Update project status
GET	/api/v1/projects	Get all projects
GET	/api/v1/projects/course/{course}	Get projects filtered by course
GET	/api/v1/projects/status	Get projects filtered by status (query param)
GET	/api/v1/projects/due-in	Get projects due within X days (query param)
GET	/api/v1/projects/completed	Get all completed projects
GET	/api/v1/projects/priority	Get projects sorted by priority
PATCH	/api/v1/projects/update-priorities	Update priorities for all projects
DELETE	/api/v1/projects/{id}	Delete a project
POST	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks	Create a new task in a project
GET	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks/{taskId}	Get a specific task by ID within a project
PUT	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks/{taskId}	Update an existing task
PATCH	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks/{taskId}/status	Update status of a task
GET	/api/v1/tasks	Get all tasks
GET	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks	Get all tasks for a specific project
GET	/api/v1/tasks/status	Get tasks filtered by status (query param)
GET	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks/incomplete	Get incomplete tasks for a project
DELETE	/api/v1/projects/{projectId}/tasks/{taskId}	Delete a task

File Structure

The tool uses and creates the following directory structure:

deadline-manager/
├── src/
│   └── main/
│       ├── java/
│       │   └── com/erikmlarson5/deadlinemanager/
│       │       ├── controller/        # REST controllers for API endpoints
│       │       ├── dto/               # Data Transfer Objects (input/output)
│       │       ├── entity/            # JPA entities mapped to PostgresSQL database tables
│       │       ├── exception/         # Global exception handling
│       │       ├── repository/        # Spring Data JPA repositories
│       │       ├── service/           # Business logic layer
│       │       ├── utils/             # Enums and utility classes
│       │       └── DeadlineManagerApplication.java  # Spring Boot main application
│       └── resources/
│           └── application.properties  # Configuration (DB, app settings)
├── .gitignore
├── mvnw
├── mvnw.cmd
├── pom.xml                          # Maven dependencies and build config
└── README.md

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• Java 17+

• Maven

• PostgreSQL

1. Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/erik-larson01/deadline-manager-api.git
cd deadline-manager-api

2. Set Up the Database

1. Start your PostgreSQL server.

2. Create a database:

CREATE DATABASE deadline_manager_db;

3. Create a user and give it access:

CREATE USER your_user WITH PASSWORD 'your_password';
GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE deadline_manager_db TO your_user;

3. Update application.properties

# Application Name
spring.application.name=Deadline Manager API

# Database Configuration
spring.datasource.url=jdbc:postgresql://localhost:5432/deadline_manager_db
spring.datasource.username=your_db_username
spring.datasource.password=your_db_password

# JPA / Hibernate Configuration
spring.jpa.hibernate.ddl-auto=update
spring.jpa.show-sql=true
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.dialect=org.hibernate.dialect.PostgreSQLDialect
spring.jpa.properties.hibernate.format_sql=true

# Server Port
# server.port=8080

4.Build and run the app

Use Maven to build and run the Spring Boot app:

./mvnw spring-boot:run

Once started, the API will be available at:

http://localhost:8080/api/v1/

Example Queries

Create a Project

POST /api/v1/projects
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "title": "Final Essay",
  "description": "Write the final essay for History 101",
  "course": "History 101",
  "dueDate": "2025-07-20",
  "weight": 20,
  "difficulty": 5,
  "status": "IN_PROGRESS"
}

Create a Task in a Project

POST /api/v1/projects/1/tasks
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "title": "Research topic",
  "description": "Gather sources for essay",
  "dueDate": "2025-07-10",
  "estimatedHours": 5,
  "difficulty": 3,
  "status": "NOT_STARTED",
  "projectId": 1
}

Update Task Status

PATCH /api/v1/projects/1/tasks/3/status?newStatus=COMPLETED

Future Improvements

• Frontend Interface: Build a user-friendly React or vanilla HTML/CSS frontend to visualize and manage projects and tasks more intuitively.

• Authentication & Authorization: Add user login support with role-based access to secure project/task data.

• Notification System: Implement email or in-app reminders for upcoming deadlines.

• Advanced Priority Tuning: Allow users to customize the weight of different priority factors (due date, difficulty, etc.).