Picknic

Guests snap photos through the app during a wedding or party, and everything pools into one shared roll that develops and is revealed at the end of the night.

.NET 10 / ASP.NET Core · Azure · Lynx (mobile) · Stripe · Terraform · Docker

Architecture

Folder	What	Tech
api/	REST API, events, photos, payments	.NET 10 / ASP.NET Core + Stripe
app/	Native mobile app	Lynx via vue-lynx + @vyui
infra/	Azure infra as code	Terraform (Container Apps, ACR, Blob Storage)

Photo blobs live in Azure Blob Storage, and metadata lives in the API's database. Payments are optional; set Stripe__SecretKey to enable paid upgrades.

Getting started

API (.NET)

The API needs a Postgres instance. Spin one up with Docker, then run the API:

docker run -d --name picknic-db -p 5432:5432 \
  -e POSTGRES_DB=picknic -e POSTGRES_USER=picknic -e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=picknic \
  postgres:17

cd api
dotnet run

The connection string lives in appsettings.Development.json (ConnectionStrings:Default); override it with ConnectionStrings__Default in production.

App (Lynx mobile)

cd app
pnpm install
pnpm dev   # scan with the Lynx Explorer app

In development the app targets a local API on port 8080. When opened from a device QR, it reuses the dev bundle host so the device calls your machine's LAN IP instead of its own localhost. To force a specific API host, create app/.env.local with PUBLIC_API_BASE=http://<host>:8080.

Everything via Docker

docker compose up --build   # api on :8080

The compose stack includes Azurite (Azure Blob emulator) on :10000, so the full photo upload → gallery flow works locally with no Azure account. The API signs account-key SAS against Azurite in dev and switches to managed-identity user-delegation SAS in production automatically. Event Grid isn't emulated — locally, photos register via the /uploads/complete client callback instead.

If the API logs Access to the path '/home/app/.aspnet/DataProtection-Keys/...' is denied, rebuild the compose stack so the dpkeys-init helper can repair the named volume permissions. If the volume was created by an older stack and still fails, remove it once with docker volume rm picknic_dpkeys, then rebuild.

Payments (Stripe)

Payments are optional. Without a key the /api/checkout endpoint returns 501 and the app runs fine. To enable them:

export STRIPE_SECRET_KEY=sk_test_...   # docker compose picks this up
# or set Stripe:SecretKey in api/appsettings.Development.json

Infrastructure (Terraform → Azure)

cd infra/terraform
cp terraform.tfvars.example terraform.tfvars   # fill in values
terraform init
terraform apply

This provisions a resource group, Container Registry, Blob Storage, a PostgreSQL flexible server, Log Analytics, and a Container App running the API. Set postgres_admin_password in terraform.tfvars; the connection string is injected into the Container App as ConnectionStrings__Default.

License

Picknic is licensed under AGPL-3.0. The code is open, but running a hosted or closed competing service requires open-sourcing your changes. The official Picknic service and name are operated by the maintainer.