Voting System

Pacopolis electronic voting system for CSCE 361. Completed 05/04/2026 with no future commits planned.

Group Members

• Cameron Adkins
• Yin Po Po Aung
• Vittoria Quaranta
• Sowparnika Sandhya

Client / Use Case Layer

These are the user-facing interactions the system must support:

• Voter Login / Authentication — Voter identifies themselves securely before accessing the ballot.
• Display Ballot — Present the voter with all current elections and issues after authentication.
• Make Selections — Voter selects candidates/choices for each race and issue.
• Review & Edit Selections — Voter can review their full ballot and change selections before submitting.
• Submit Ballot — Final submission locks in the voter's choices.
• View Recorded Vote — A voter can later look up their own vote to confirm it was recorded correctly.
• Third-Party Voter Participation Check — A third party can confirm whether someone voted, but not how they voted.
• Declare Winners — At end of voting day, system calculates and announces winners for each race/issue.

Manager Layer

Orchestrates business logic and workflows:

• Election Manager — Manages the lifecycle of an election: setup, active voting period, and closure.
• Ballot Manager — Assembles the correct ballot for each voter based on active elections.
• Voter Session Manager — Tracks an in-progress voting session; handles review/edit flow before submission.
• Duplicate Vote Prevention — Enforces the rule that a voter may cast a ballot only once per election.
• Results Manager — Tallies votes and determines winners/outcomes at end of voting day.
• Audit/Privacy Manager — Enforces privacy rules: separates voter identity from vote choices in storage and retrieval.

Engine Layer

Core business logic and computation:

• Vote Encryption/Anonymization Engine — Helps prevent a third party from linking a voter to their choices.
• Winner Determination Engine — Implements vote-counting rules for each election type (plurality, majority, yes/no issue, etc.).
• Authentication Engine — Validates voter credentials and identity.
• Ballot Validation Engine — Validates that all required selections are made before submission is allowed.

Resource Access Layer

Data persistence and external integrations:

• Voter Database — Stores voter registration data, credentials, and voting status (voted / not voted).
• Election & Ballot Database — Stores all elections, candidates, issues, and their configurations.
• Vote Record Store — Stores submitted votes in a way that preserves anonymity (decoupled from voter identity).
• Audit Log — Immutable log recording who voted (not how), timestamps, and system events.

Infrastructure / Cross-Cutting

• Multi-Client Access Support — Allow voters to vote from personal computers or shared polling-location machines.
• Role-Based Access Control — Separate access rules for voters vs. admins vs. third-party auditors.
• Election Configuration Interface — Admin UI/tool to define elections, add candidates, set voting windows, and close elections.

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Setup

Requirements: .NET 8 SDK, Node.js 18+

Repo layout:

• frontend/ — React app (Vite)
• backend/ — C# solution (View, Managers, Engines, ResourceAccess, DataContracts, Tests)

Set up the database connection:

1. Install the mssql extension in VS Code
2. Copy the config template:
   • Mac/Linux: cp backend/VotingSystem.View/appsettings.Development.json.template backend/VotingSystem.View/appsettings.Development.json
   • Windows: copy backend\VotingSystem.View\appsettings.Development.json.template backend\VotingSystem.View\appsettings.Development.json
3. Open appsettings.Development.json and replace the YOUR_* placeholders with the Azure SQL credentials (get these from the team group chat)
4. Connect to the Azure SQL server in VS Code (Ctrl+Alt+D → Add Connection → use the server/credentials from the connection string)
5. Run backend/Database/Schema.sql against the PacopolisVoting database

Note: Never commit appsettings.Development.json — it contains secrets and is gitignored.

Run the backend (development):

cd backend
dotnet restore
dotnet build
ASPNETCORE_ENVIRONMENT=Development dotnet run --project VotingSystem.View

The ASPNETCORE_ENVIRONMENT=Development flag is required so the backend reads appsettings.Development.json with the real database connection string. Without it, the API will return errors on every request.

Run the frontend (development):

cd frontend
npm install
npm run dev

Frontend runs on http://localhost:3000, proxies /api requests to the backend on http://localhost:5000.

In dev mode, a Dev button appears in the header with tools for testing: reset votes, quick login with test accounts, and page navigation.

Run the frontend (production preview):

cd frontend
npm run build
npx vite preview --port 4000

Production build on http://localhost:4000. Dev tools are stripped out.

Run tests:

cd backend
dotnet test

Run static analysis:

Backend uses built-in Roslyn analyzers configured via backend/Directory.Build.props and backend/.editorconfig. Analyzer findings show up as warnings in the build output:

cd backend
dotnet build

To auto-fix style issues:

cd backend
dotnet format

Frontend uses ESLint (flat config at frontend/eslint.config.js) with React and React Hooks rules:

cd frontend
npm run lint

Both run in CI; the frontend lint step is blocking.

Test accounts: All share password husker2026

Username	Name
tfrazier	Tommie Frazier
ecrouch	Eric Crouch
bberringer	Brook Berringer
jrodgers	Johnny Rodgers
mrozier	Mike Rozier