How to build

This guide explains how to set up your development environment for building and running the Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Builder and Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Web projects. These instructions focus on Ubuntu, with notes on differences for other operating systems.

Prerequisites

.NET 9 SDK

The projects require .NET 9 SDK. To install it on Ubuntu:

Add the Microsoft package repository:
wget https://packages.microsoft.com/config/ubuntu/$(lsb_release -rs)/packages-microsoft-prod.deb -O packages-microsoft-prod.deb sudo dpkg -i packages-microsoft-prod.deb rm packages-microsoft-prod.deb
Install the .NET 9 SDK:

   sudo apt-get update
   sudo apt-get install -y dotnet-sdk-9.0

Verify the installation:

dotnet --version

Note: For Windows and macOS, download and install the .NET 9 SDK from the https://dotnet.microsoft.com/download/dotnet/9.0. The installation process differs on these platforms.

Node.js and npm

Both projects use Tailwind CSS, which requires Node.js and npm:

Install Node.js and npm (recommended to use NVM for Node version management):

   curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.39.7/install.sh | bash
   source ~/.bashrc
   nvm install 20.11.0
   nvm use 20.11.0

Verify the installation:

   node --version
   npm --version

IDE Options

You'll need one of the following IDEs:

JetBrains Rider: Download and install from https://www.jetbrains.com/rider/download/. Recommended for cross-platform development.
Visual Studio Code: Install from https://code.visualstudio.com/ along with the C# extension.
Visual Studio: Available for Windows and macOS (Visual Studio for Mac).

Clone the Repository

Clone the main repo:

git clone https://github.com/bsandmann/blocktrust.CredentialBadges

You'll also need the DidPrismResolverClient project. Clone it next to the CredentialBadges project, not inside it! You can find it here:

git clone https://github.com/bsandmann/DidPrismResolverClient

The second project is used by multiple other projects and is just a .net wrapper for the OPN DID resolver.

Building the Projects

Common Steps for Both Projects

Restore the .NET dependencies:

dotnet restore

Building Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Builder

Navigate to the Builder project directory:

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Builder

Install npm dependencies for Tailwind CSS:

npm install

Start the Tailwind CSS watcher in a separate terminal:

npx tailwindcss -i ./TailwindStyles/app.css -o ./wwwroot/app.css --watch

Build the project:

dotnet build

Run the project:

dotnet run

Building Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Web

Navigate to the Web project directory:

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Web

Install npm dependencies for Tailwind CSS:

npm install

Start the Tailwind CSS watcher in a separate terminal:

npx tailwindcss -i ./TailwindStyles/app.css -o ./wwwroot/app.css --watch

Build the project:

dotnet build

Run the project:

dotnet run

Running Both Projects Together

For a complete development environment, you'll need to run both projects simultaneously. You can:

Run each project in a separate terminal with its own Tailwind CSS watcher
Use the solution file with your IDE to run multiple projects

In terminal 1 - Builder project with Tailwind

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Builder
npx tailwindcss -i ./TailwindStyles/app.css -o ./wwwroot/app.css --watch

In terminal 2 - Builder project

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Builder
dotnet run

In terminal 3 - Web project with Tailwind

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Web
npx tailwindcss -i ./TailwindStyles/app.css -o ./wwwroot/app.css --watch

In terminal 4 - Web project

cd Blocktrust.CredentialBadges.Web
dotnet run

Configure Application Settings

For information on configuring the applications with appropriate connection strings and environment variables, please refer to the "How to Run" section of the documentation.

Additional Notes

Both projects use PostgreSQL as the database backend
The projects use Entity Framework Core for database access
Make sure your IDE is configured to use the correct .NET version (9.0)
When running the Tailwind CSS watcher, any changes to Razor or HTML files will automatically regenerate the CSS

Last modified: 19 March 2025