DeepRead (React + Express)

Modernized glass-style daily AI/ML papers app using a Vite/React client and an Express API proxy to arXiv.

Stack

• Frontend: React 18 + Vite, custom CSS.
• Backend: Express + fast-xml-parser, JSON file store for user interests/history.
• Deploy: works on Render/Railway (backend) + GitHub Pages/Vercel (frontend).

Quick start (local dev)

Prereqs: Node 18+ and npm.

1. Start the API (uses PORT, defaults to 5050 to avoid macOS 5000 conflict):

   cd server
   npm install
   PORT=5050 npm start

   Runs on http://localhost:5050 by default.

2. Start the client (separate terminal):

   cd client
   npm install
   # point to your API; for local server on 5050:
   VITE_API_BASE=http://localhost:5050/api npm run dev -- --host

   Vite dev server: http://localhost:5173. If you prefer the proxy, start the client with API_PORT=5050 npm run dev -- --host and use /api in the client.

API

• GET /api/health — simple health check.
• GET /api/papers?interests=comma,separated&preferFresh=true|false
  • interests: optional, comma-separated keywords. Up to 12 kept.
  • preferFresh: true to sort by submission date, otherwise last-updated. Returns { source: "live" | "fallback", papers: [...], lastUpdated }.

Client notes

• Interests and history are persisted in localStorage (gp_interests, gp_history).
• Buttons disable during fetches; fallbacks show if the API call fails.
• Set VITE_API_BASE to point at a remote API; set VITE_BASE to your repo base when building for GitHub Pages (e.g., /your-repo-name/). Defaults are /api for dev and / base for builds.

Deploy

Backend (Render/Railway):

• Build: npm install
• Start: npm start
• Env: PORT=5050 (or your choice). Copy the public URL, e.g., https://your-app.onrender.com/api.

Frontend (GitHub Pages via workflow in .github/workflows/deploy-gh-pages.yml):

• Set repo secret VITE_API_BASE to your backend URL (include /api).
• Workflow sets VITE_BASE=/<repo-name>/ for Pages.
• On push to main, the action builds client/dist and publishes to gh-pages. Ensure Pages source is set to gh-pages.

Frontend (Vercel):

• Root: client
• Build: npm run build
• Output: dist
• Env: VITE_API_BASE=https://your-app.onrender.com/api
• Optional: VITE_BASE=/

Notes on arXiv rendering

• Abstracts escape HTML, render \emph{} / \textit{}, inline $...$ and simple \frac{a}{b}, and map common Greek tokens (e.g., \varepsilon -> ε).
• History pills link directly to the arXiv paper URLs.