Building

Foldr
A cloud storage platform like Google Drive with file sharing, trash, favorites and S3 uploads.
Overview
Foldr is a cloud storage platform inspired by Google Drive that allows users to upload files to AWS S3, manage them with folders, mark favorites, share files securely, and restore/delete from trash. The goal was to build a scalable storage product with clean UX and production-level backend patterns.
What Users Can Do
- Upload files & manage them with a clean file manager UI.
- Create folders and organize content like Google Drive.
- Mark important files as favorites.
- Move files to trash and restore/delete permanently.
- Share files with other users using secure sharing links.
- Preview files in a dedicated viewer page.
- Quickly search and filter files.
Why I built this
- To learn how real-world storage products work end-to-end.
- To build production-level file upload pipelines using AWS S3.
- To understand how to store metadata in MongoDB and sync with S3.
- To practice authentication, authorization and secure access patterns.
- To build a portfolio-worthy project that feels like a real product.
Tech Stack
Next.js
TypeScript
Vercel
Tailwind CSS
Shadcn UI
After launch & Impact
- Built a scalable upload pipeline using AWS S3 + metadata tracking in MongoDB.
- Learned a lot about secure file access, signed URLs, and permissions.
- Implemented file preview navigation similar to Google Drive.
- Improved performance by optimizing server components + caching strategy.
- Learned deployment constraints on Vercel (cookies, CORS, etc.).
Future Plans
- Add folder sharing & role-based access (viewer/editor).
- Add realtime collaboration on shared folders.
- Improve file search with tags and full-text indexing.
- Add file versioning (upload history).
- Add activity logs for every file action.