Educational ProjectCase Study
Periodic Tables Reservation System
A completed educational full-stack application demonstrating relational data modeling, validated CRUD workflows, reservation and table-state management, and operational system design.
Role
Solo Full-Stack Developer
Status
Built
Focus
Relational Data + Workflow Validation
Type
Educational Full-Stack Application
Overview
Modeling a multi-step operational workflow
Periodic Tables is a completed educational reservation-management application built around interconnected reservation, seating, and table-status workflows. The project required coordinating frontend interactions, API behavior, business-rule validation, and relational data while keeping each workflow state understandable to the user.
Problem
Keeping related reservation and seating states consistent
Reservation management involves more than storing booking details. Reservations must move through valid states, tables must reflect current availability, and seating actions must follow operational rules. The application needed to coordinate these related records and prevent invalid actions from producing inconsistent data or confusing workflow states.
Goals
What the application needed to accomplish
- Support reservation creation, review, editing, cancellation, and seating workflows
- Model relationships among reservations, tables, capacity, and status
- Enforce business rules through frontend and backend validation
- Keep database records and visible workflow states consistent
- Provide responsive interfaces for completing common operational tasks
System
Connecting user actions to validated relational data
The application separated interface behavior, API requests, business-rule validation, query logic, and relational storage. Each reservation or table action moved through these layers before the updated state was returned to the interface.
Reservation or table action
↓
React workflow interface
↓
Express API endpoint
↓
Validation and business rules
↓
Knex query layer
↓
PostgreSQL relational data
↓
Updated workflow state
Technology
Tools used
The application used React for workflow interfaces, Express.js for API and backend behavior, Knex.js for database queries and migrations, and PostgreSQL for relational data storage.
- React
- Express.js
- PostgreSQL
- Knex.js
- JavaScript
- CSS
Application Work
Key implementation areas
- Reservation creation, editing, search, and cancellation
- Table creation and capacity management
- Reservation seating and table assignment
- Reservation and table-status transitions
- Frontend and backend validation for operational rules
- Database-backed coordination of related records
Technical Decisions
Implementation choices shaped by workflow integrity
Model related records relationally
Reservations and tables have connected states and constraints. PostgreSQL provided a structured way to represent those relationships, enforce consistency, and query the records needed for each workflow.
Validate across application layers
User-facing validation supported clearer interaction, while backend validation protected business rules and data integrity when reservation and table actions reached the API.
Make state transitions explicit
Reservation and table workflows depend on valid status changes. The implementation treated those transitions as defined operational actions rather than allowing records to change without context.
Constraints
Coordinating rules across related workflows
A change to one record could affect several parts of the application. Seating a reservation, for example, required the reservation and table to meet specific conditions before both states could be updated correctly. The project required careful coordination among interface behavior, API logic, validation, queries, and error handling.
Outcome
What the completed project demonstrates
The completed application demonstrates full-stack development, relational data modeling, SQL-backed workflows, CRUD operations, layered validation, API design, state management, and systematic handling of operational rules. It provides concrete evidence of the structured-data, workflow-analysis, testing, and problem-solving foundation I bring to systems, data-quality, and health-information work.
Further Development
How the application could continue to evolve
- Expand automated testing for validation rules, state transitions, and edge cases
- Strengthen reporting around reservation volume, table use, and workflow activity
- Improve error states and recovery guidance for invalid actions
- Refine accessibility and responsive behavior across workflow screens
- Modernize technical documentation and deployment instructions