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EasyPollVote [Dev Log #3]

Switch-case routing for form actions

Welcome to the Third DEV LOG!

Welcome to the third Dev Log of my full stack application called EasyPollVote (EasyPV)!

 


What is EasyPollVote (EasyPV)?

A Next.js application where the ultimate goal is having the convenience to create your own poll and share it for others to vote on your custom poll!

For example, a user can create their own poll. Their poll can be something like "Do you like Cats or Dogs?" following the two options users can vote on "Cats" or "Dogs". Then, they will be able to send the private link to anyone and the voters can vote on it without the need to create an account!

That is the whole goal. Do note that this goal may change as time goes on!

The current goal is to learn about the use of Supabase!

 


Current Progress

Made small progress. Still fixing the issue of the End Date where it is inconsistent. Speaking of timing, I need to fix the PokeAPI, so it can update on the appropriate date.

Anyway, added a Title on the front page :)

Also, thank you @sylwia-lask for the feedback on the responsive issue!


The issue should be fixed now! :D

With the changes made, I did mention I will get into detail on how the front page (Voting your Pokemon form) functionality work. Do note the solution I have is not perfect and I had ChatGPT to assist me on this project. Feedback is greatly appreciated :)

 

Demo Voting Poll in detail!

Image

I will be discussing on this demo poll. The main functionality is when you start to submit the form. This is the current structure:

{/* Form */ }
<form onSubmit={handleSubmit} className="flex flex-col gap-2 p-10">
    <h1 className="text-center text-xl font-semibold">
        Voting Form
    </h1>
    <input
        name="name"
        placeholder="Name (required)"
        value={formData.name}
        onChange={handleChange}
        className="p-2 border"
        required
    />

    <input
        name="email"
        placeholder="Email (required)"
        value={formData.email}
        onChange={handleChange}
        className="p-2 border"
        required
    />

    {pokemonList.map((pokemon, index) => (
        <label key={index} className="flex items-center gap-2 p-2 border-2 cursor-pointer hover:bg-gray-50 dark:hover:bg-gray-700">
            <input
                type="radio"
                name="vote"
                value={pokemon.name}
                onChange={handleChange}
            />
            {pokemon.name}
        </label>
    ))}

    <button disabled={loading} className="bg-blue-500 text-white p-2">
        Submit
    </button>

    {message && <p>{message}</p>}
</form>
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You may notice the two big variables: handleChange and handleSubmit.

For handleChange, nothing really big is going on. It is basically updating the formData variable based on the user's input. So when the user click submit, the formData will be sent to the database.

const [formData, setFormData] = useState({
    name: "",
    email: "",
    vote: "",
    // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
    action: "Demo",
});


...


// Handles anything Input related on the Voting Demo Form
const handleChange = (e: any) => {
    setFormData({ ...formData, [e.target.name]: e.target.value });
};
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For the handleSubmit, this is where the main functionality takes place!

// When the Form is submitted
const handleSubmit = async (e: any) => {
    e.preventDefault();
    setMessage("");

    // If the user did not vote a specific pokemon, error message is shown
    if (!formData.vote) {
        setMessage("Error: Please select a Pokémon to vote for.");
        return;
    }

    // If all inputs are entered, perform a POST request in the route.ts where we head to the "Demo" switch statement
    const res = await fetch("/api/vote", {
        method: "POST",
        headers: {
            "Content-Type": "application/json",
        },
        body: JSON.stringify({
            name: formData.name,
            email: formData.email,
            vote: formData.vote,
            action: "Demo", // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
        }),
    });

    const data = await res.json();

    if (!res.ok) {
        setMessage(data?.error || "Error: Form submission failed.");
    } else {
        setMessage("Vote submitted successfully!");
        setFormData({
            name: "",
            email: "",
            vote: "",
            action: "Demo", // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
        });
    }
};
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When the user clicks "Submit", it checks to see if the user selected their vote. If not, it prompts the error to the user that they need to vote:

// If the user did not vote a specific pokemon, error message is shown
if (!formData.vote) {
    setMessage("Error: Please select a Pokémon to vote for.");
    return;
}
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If the check is all good, it performs a POST request on /api/vote and sending it to the database. After that, the form clears out:

// If all inputs are entered, perform a POST request in the route.ts where we head to the "Demo" switch statement
const res = await fetch("/api/vote", {
    method: "POST",
    headers: {
        "Content-Type": "application/json",
    },
    body: JSON.stringify({
        name: formData.name,
        email: formData.email,
        vote: formData.vote,
        action: "Demo", // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
    }),
});

const data = await res.json();

if (!res.ok) {
    setMessage(data?.error || "Error: Form submission failed.");
} else {
    setMessage("Vote submitted successfully!");
    setFormData({
        name: "",
        email: "",
        vote: "",
        action: "Demo", // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
    });
}
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That's pretty much what's happening on the client side. You may also notice this part:

action: "Demo", // Not uploaded to the Database. This is used for route.ts switch case
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In the api/vote folder, I have multiple PUT requests in where inside of the PUT request, there is a switch case. I won't be able to go into detail now, but one thing to note that it is used to identify which code to execute. In this case, it's "Demo":

case "Demo": {
    const { name, email, vote } = body;

    if (!name || !email || !vote) {
        return NextResponse.json(
            { error: "Missing name, email, or vote" },
            { status: 400 }
        );
    }

    // Insert the row that contains their name, email, and the vote they voted for
    const { error } = await supabase
        .from("VoteDemo")
        .insert([
            {
                Name: name,
                Email: email,
                Vote: vote,
            },
        ]);

    if (error) {
        console.log("Supabase insert error (VoteDemo):", error);

        return NextResponse.json(
            { error: error.message },
            { status: 500 }
        );
    }

    return NextResponse.json({
        success: true,
        message: "Vote saved successfully in VoteDemo",
    });
}
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Simply put, it does an insert statement to the "VoteDemo" table of the Name, Email, and Vote (yes @bingkahu, I saw your many votes. on that database).

That is pretty much it for that page. Next week, I will discuss more detail on how the Custom Polls work!

 


Official Website

If you would love to see the project yourself, feel free to check out the link here: https://easypollvote.vercel.app

I recommend to put a fake email and a fake name if you are using the app. Everything works as intended! Check it out and feedback is greatly appreciated!

 


Any questions/comments/feedback? I would love to hear from you!

 

Note: This post is monitored by the University and therefore the repository is currently private until the early Summer!

Top comments (27)

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sylwia-lask profile image
Sylwia Laskowska

Haha come on folks, let's vote in my custom poll!!! easypollvote.vercel.app/poll/78
I prefer Umbreon, but I have to admit I like the name Sylveon 😂

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luftietheanonymous profile image
Luftie The Anonymous • Edited

How about Gengar @sylwia-lask ?

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sylwia-lask profile image
Sylwia Laskowska

Umberon is dark-type, so it beats Gengar easily!

Thread Thread
 
luftietheanonymous profile image
Luftie The Anonymous

Ghost / Poison, madam. Poison attacks beat dark :D

Thread Thread
 
sylwia-lask profile image
Sylwia Laskowska

Ah, damn! So it's a fair fight 🤣

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luftietheanonymous profile image
Comment deleted
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sylwia-lask profile image
Sylwia Laskowska

Hahaha sure, marking it to read tomorrow!

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Sylveon ftw 🥰

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peacebinflow profile image
PEACEBINFLOW

The action field as a switch-case router is the detail that caught my attention. It's the kind of pattern you reach for when you're building something real and the clean abstractions haven't arrived yet. You need one endpoint to handle multiple form types, you don't want to over-engineer it, so you toss an action string into the payload and let the backend sort it out. It works. It's readable. It'll probably get refactored later, and that's fine.

What I think is worth flagging is that action: "Demo" is currently client-side and hardcoded. The comment says it's not uploaded to the database, which makes sense—it's routing metadata, not user data. But if someone opens the browser dev tools and changes that "Demo" string to "Live" or "Admin" before submitting, does the backend just trust it? That's the kind of thing that's harmless in a university project but becomes a real vulnerability if the switch case ever includes privileged paths. Not a problem now. Just one of those things that quietly graduates from "works" to "wait, is this safe" once more people start using it.

The @bingkahu mention got a laugh. There's always one person who stress-tests your database with joke votes during development, and honestly it's useful. Better to find edge cases from someone goofing around than from a real user who's confused. Did any of those many votes surface something you hadn't thought about, or was it just volume?

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Hey Thanks for the feedback!

But if someone opens the browser dev tools and changes that "Demo" string to "Live" or "Admin" before submitting, does the backend just trust it?

Unfortunately, yes. There are currently no safeguards for that. As of now, it is not really a priority because the worst case scenario is uploading to the wrong database, hence resulting in an error due to a mismatch. In the future, if I were to do authentication, that is something to actually think about.

Did any of those many votes surface something you hadn't thought about, or was it just volume?

Pretty much both. I was hoping to see how it would look like in the back-end and how data will populate. To be fair, I mention to put fake information just in case. Sometime it is sometimes it's not. Either way, seems to be working as expected. Currently, there is no implementation where you can only vote once. I am planning on doing email verification where you enter your email and you get a 6 digit code to verify. Once you have voted, you cannot use that same email again.

Thanks again!

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kushal1o1 profile image
KUSHAL BARAL

Bro,It would be great to add some simple validation to improve poll accuracy
Right now it seems anyone can submit multiple responses, which can easily introduce bias. A few lightweight improvements could make a big difference :)
Basic IP-based restriction (limit repeated votes)
Email or ownership verification (optional but helpful)
Simple device tracking (to reduce duplicate submissions)
Rate limiting (to prevent spam/bot voting)

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Hey Kushal! Hope you are well. I am hoping for the "Email or ownership verification". I think it's a good step but I am holding that off for the summer time for now! Thanks :D

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kushal1o1 profile image
KUSHAL BARAL

okie :)

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0xdevc profile image
NOVAInetwork

This is why I started my project from scratch instead of
forking an existing codebase. The temptation to fork
Substrate or Tendermint was real but you inherit years of
decisions that don't match your use case. Starting clean
is slower but every line exists for a reason you
understand.

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Great point! It's always a good idea to start from scratch. The only case for forking an existing project is if you are working to contribute to OpenSource and fixing a bug that you wanted to fix.

Thanks :D

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ai_made_tools profile image
Joske Vermeulen

I will try to use it next week andprovide you with feedback

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jackbuilds profile image
Jack

wow this is sick!

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Thanks Jack! :D

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mileswk profile image
MilesWK

Tailwind or Standard?

easypollvote.vercel.app/poll/82

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luftietheanonymous profile image
Luftie The Anonymous

Cool I also work on an pokemon project, but with web3 and zk. My last project for frontend and smart-contracts.

Btw feel free to checkout my article, I mentioned you broskito.

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Sounds good! and yes, I saw your latest article about mentioning me about the markdown. Thanks for the mention :)

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laura_ashaley_be356544300 profile image
Laura Ashaley

Nice dev log update consistent iteration like this is how real products evolve. Small features + feedback loops usually matter more than big initial builds.

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Thanks Laura!

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sahl profile image
Sahl Tariq

Hi there! Have you considered separating each action into dedicated API routes instead of relying on a single endpoint with a switch-case? What trade-offs led you to this design?

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francistrdev profile image
FrancisTRᴅᴇᴠ (っ◔◡◔)っ

Hey Sahl! There was an issue I came across (that I do not remember) that led me to create a single endpoint with switch-cases. I am planning on refactoring the code to make it more cleaner and also for security reasons I can imagine. It was built as I go type and there wasn't really a design to go out of. Thanks Sahl!

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