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Getting Started Set up your dev environment, run TrainUs locally, and make your first change. getting-started 1 2026-06-16

What You'll Need

  • Node.js ≥ 18
  • Python ≥ 3.10 (only needed to run the test suite)
  • A modern browser — Firefox 111+, Chrome 102+, or Safari 16.4+. TrainUs relies on OPFS (Origin Private File System) for its database, which doesn't exist in older browsers or in private/incognito windows.

Clone and Install

git clone <repo-url>
cd trainUs
npm install

Run the App

npm run dev

This starts the Vite dev server at http://localhost:5173. Open it in your browser — on first launch, TrainUs creates a local database and generates a random user ID for you. There's nothing else to configure: no .env file, no server, no account.

A Quick Tour of src/

You don't need to memorize this — just enough to know where to look:

Folder What's in it
views/ One Vue component per route (ExerciseListView.vue, SettingsView.vue, …)
components/ Smaller, reusable pieces used across views (dialogs, the action bar, …)
composables/ Reactive state + logic shared between components (useExercises, useSessionExecution, …)
db/ Everything SQLite: the worker, the schema, and one repository per entity in db/repositories/
i18n/locales/ Translation files — en.json, fr.json, da.json
styles/ CSS variables (theming) and global layout rules
utils/ Small pure helper functions (validation, date formatting, Markdown rendering, …)

The [Reference]({{< relref "technical.en.md" >}}) page covers this in full detail — schema, routes, every composable. Keep it open in a tab once you start working on something real.

Run the Test Suite

TrainUs is tested end-to-end with Playwright, driven from Python. The dev server starts automatically for the duration of the test run — you don't need npm run dev running separately.

cd tests
python -m venv .venv
.venv/bin/pip install -r requirements.txt
.venv/bin/playwright install firefox chromium
cd ..
npm test                 # Firefox only — the project's primary target
npm run test:parallel    # Firefox + Chromium, in parallel

See tests/README.md in the repository for the full setup if anything above doesn't work out of the box.

Make a Small Change

Before tackling anything real, it's worth closing the loop once: edit something, see it reload, run the checks.

  1. With npm run dev running, open src/i18n/locales/en.json and change the value of "settings.title" to something else — e.g. "Settings (testing)".

  2. Save the file. The browser should hot-reload and show your change on the Settings page.

  3. Revert the change, then run the formatter to confirm your editor setup matches the project's:

    npm run format:check
    

That's the full inner loop: edit → reload → format check. The [How-to Guides]({{< relref "how-to-guides.en.md" >}}) page walks through complete, realistic tasks (adding a language, adding a theme, deploying, adding a migration) built on exactly this loop.

Going Further

  • [How-to Guides]({{< relref "how-to-guides.en.md" >}}) — concrete recipes for common contributor tasks.
  • [Reference]({{< relref "technical.en.md" >}}) — architecture, database schema, routes, and every composable, in detail.
  • [Understanding the Architecture]({{< relref "understanding-the-architecture.en.md" >}}) — the why behind the choices: local-first, the Worker thread, the migration system.