Voting System

Overview

A simple Flask-based voting application. Users vote for candidates for a list of posts. Votes are stored in a JSON file on the server. A results endpoint calculates winners and an Excel export can be generated via result.py.

Features

• Interactive voting UI (JavaScript + Flask backend)
• Dark / light theme toggle
• JSON persistence of vote counts
• Endpoint to update vote data (POST /updatejson)
• Endpoint to fetch current data (GET /getjson)
• Endpoint to fetch winners (GET /results)
• Script to build initial candidate list from a posts text file (import-data.py)
• Script to export winners to Excel (result.py)

Project Structure (key files)

• server.py - Flask app and API endpoints
• run.py - Entry point to run the dev server
• templates/index.html - Voting page template
• static/Js/main.js - Voting logic (fetch/update JSON)
• templates/Data/Data.json - Persisted vote data
• result.py - Functions to compute winners and export to Excel
• import-data.py - Interactive script to seed candidate data
• merge.py - Merges two JSON vote files (for aggregating results)

Setup

1. Create and activate a virtual environment (optional but recommended).
2. Install dependencies:

   pip install -r requirements.txt
   

3. Seed candidate data (optional):

   python import-data.py
   

   Select your Posts.txt file when prompted and enter candidate names.
4. Run the server:

   python run.py
   

5. Open http://127.0.0.1:8000 in your browser to vote.

API Endpoints

• GET /getjson returns the full vote data array.
• POST /updatejson accepts the full updated vote data array and overwrites the JSON file.
• GET /results returns an object mapping each post to the winning candidate.

Data Format

[
	{
		"post": "Owner",
		"candidates": [
			{"name": "Alice", "votes": 3},
			{"name": "Bob", "votes": 5}
		]
	}
]

Exporting Results

Run:

python result.py

This creates results.xlsx listing each post and the winning candidate.

Merging Vote Files

If you collected votes in separate JSON files, place a second file named final.json beside merge.py containing the same structure and edit the paths if needed, then run:

python merge.py

It sums votes per candidate (matching by position and order) and rewrites final.json with merged totals.

Future Improvements

• Add per-user authentication & one-vote-per-user enforcement
• Record individual ballots rather than only aggregated counts
• Input form for creating posts and candidates via the web interface
• Add unit tests (pytest) for validation and result logic
• Better error handling and logging

License

Currently unspecified. Add a license file if you intend to distribute.