💬 Chit-O-Chat

A real-time chat application built using Node.js, Express, Socket.IO and HTML, CSS, JS that enables multiple users to connect and communicate instantly in a shared chatroom.

🚀 Features

• 🌐 Real-time communication using WebSockets
• 📥 User joins and leaves notifications
• ✍️ Instant message broadcasting
• 💻 Minimal, responsive front-end UI
• ⚡ Lightweight and fast performance

📸 Chit-O-Chat UI

🛠️ Tech Stack

• Frontend: HTML, CSS, JavaScript
• Backend: Node.js, Express
• WebSocket: Socket.IO

🛠️ Installation and Setup

• Install nodejs
• Intialize npm to create package.json file: npm init --yes
• Install expressjs: npm install --save express
• Install socket.io: npm install --save socket.io
• Use MongoDB for database
• Install mongoose: npm install --save mongoose

🖥️ How to Run The Project Locally

1. Prerequisites

• Node.js
• MongoDB Community Server

2. Installation

• Navigate to the ChatApp directory.
• Install all dependencies with:

  npm install

3. Running the Application

• Start your local MongoDB service. (For macOS with Homebrew, the command is brew services start mongodb-community)

• Start the Node.js server.

  node server.js

4. Accessing the Application

• Open your web browser and navigate to http://localhost:5000