Dochat - AI Customer Support Agent SAAS

Tech Stack

• Framework: Next.js 15 (Turbopack)
• Monorepo: pnpm workspaces + Turborepo
• Database: PostgreSQL + Prisma
• Auth: Clerk
• Payments: DodoPayments
• AI: DigitalOcean GenAI Platform
• Storage: DigitalOcean Spaces (S3-compatible)
• Real-time: Server-Sent Events (SSE) + in-memory event bus

Project Structure

apps/
  web/       → Main dashboard app (Next.js)
  widget/    → Embeddable chat widget (Next.js)
packages/
  db/        → Prisma schema & client
  ui/        → Shared UI components
  shared/    → Shared utilities

Key Modules

apps/web/lib/
  digitalocean/          → DO GenAI API integration layer
    types.ts             → Shared API request/response types
    errors.ts            → DoApiError class
    client.ts            → Typed HTTP client (doFetch, doFetchRaw)
    agents.api.ts        → Agent CRUD, access keys, visibility
    knowledge-bases.api.ts → KB CRUD, datasource management
    workspaces.api.ts    → Workspace CRUD
    indexing.api.ts      → KB indexing triggers & status polling
  agent.ts               → Agent provisioning, sync, chat orchestration
  knowledge-base.ts      → KB provisioning, indexing, datasource building
  auth.ts                → Clerk auth helpers, subscription bootstrapping
  event-bus.ts           → In-memory pub/sub for real-time SSE events
  limits.ts              → Plan-based usage limits & credit checks

Architecture

The DigitalOcean GenAI integration follows a layered architecture:

1. Types & Errors (types.ts, errors.ts) — Shared type definitions and error classes
2. HTTP Client (client.ts) — Authenticated fetch wrapper with error handling
3. API Modules (*.api.ts) — Low-level DO API calls, one module per resource
4. Service Layer (agent.ts, knowledge-base.ts) — Business logic that orchestrates API calls with database operations

Local Development

pnpm install
cp .env.example .env   # fill in your values
pnpm db:generate
pnpm db:push
pnpm dev

Web app: http://localhost:3005 | Widget: http://localhost:3006

Environment Variables

Create a .env file in the project root:

# Database
DATABASE_URL=

# Clerk Auth
NEXT_PUBLIC_CLERK_PUBLISHABLE_KEY=
CLERK_SECRET_KEY=

# DigitalOcean GenAI
DIGITALOCEAN_API_TOKEN=
DO_PROJECT_ID=
DO_AGENT_REGION=
DO_AGENT_MODEL_UUID=
DO_EMBEDDING_MODEL_UUID=
DO_FREE_OPENSEARCH_DB_ID=

# Widget
NEXT_PUBLIC_WIDGET_URL=http://localhost:3006

# Landing page widget (optional — shows demo widget on marketing page)
NEXT_PUBLIC_LANDING_WIDGET_ORG_ID=
NEXT_PUBLIC_LANDING_WIDGET_AGENT_ID=

# DigitalOcean Spaces (S3-compatible storage for KB file uploads)
SPACES_ACCESS_KEY_ID=
SPACES_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=
SPACES_BUCKET=
SPACES_REGION=

# DodoPayments
DODO_PAYMENTS_API_KEY=
DODO_PAYMENTS_ENVIRONMENT=
DODO_PAYMENTS_WEBHOOK_SECRET=
DODO_STARTER_PRODUCT_ID=
DODO_GROWTH_PRODUCT_ID=
DODO_SCALE_PRODUCT_ID=

Deployment (DigitalOcean App Platform)

Prerequisites

1. DigitalOcean account with GitHub connected (authorize repo access)
2. doctl CLI installed and authenticated:

   brew install doctl
   doctl auth init

3. A PostgreSQL database (managed or external) with DATABASE_URL in your .env

Deploy

bash .do/deploy.sh

That's it. The script reads your .env, injects secrets into the app spec, and creates/updates the app via doctl. No secrets are committed to git.

How It Works

• .do/app.yaml defines a two-service app spec (web + widget) with __PLACEHOLDER__ values for secrets
• .do/deploy.sh replaces placeholders with real values from .env at deploy time
• The generated spec is temporary and deleted after deployment
• deploy_on_push: true auto-deploys on every push to main
• Ingress routes /widget/* to the widget service, everything else to the web service
• DO App Platform strips the /widget prefix before forwarding — the widget uses assetPrefix (not basePath) accordingly

First Deploy

After the first successful deployment, push your database schema:

DATABASE_URL="<your-db-url>" pnpm db:push

Custom Domain

Add via the dashboard under App > Settings > Domains, or in .do/app.yaml:

domains:
  - domain: yourdomain.com
    type: PRIMARY

Then CNAME your domain to the .ondigitalocean.app URL.