Platform Overview
#################

The Open edX Platform is made up of multiple web services that work together to
provide all the tools you might need to build and run courses online.

Tech Stack
**********

While there are a few exceptions, for the most part the technology stack for the
Open edX Platform uses `Django`_ for backend services and `React`_ for the frontend.
The frontend consists of multiple frontend apps which are usually referred to as
MFEs (Micro-FrontEnds) within the ecosystem and community.

The core code base lives on GitHub in the `openedx`_ organization.

Platform Layout
***************

While the platform contains many services such as MFEs and libraries, the
core of the platform lives in the `edx-platform`_ and `frontend-platform`
repositories.

* edx-platform - This was the first service created in the Open edX ecosystem and
  contains the legacy monolith application. That application currently can run
  in two modes: LMS and Studio.

  As the LMS (Learning Management System), it acts as the backend
  for learners' data as they go through courses and programs, and it serves some 
  legacy UI elements.

  As Studio, it is the CMS(Content Management System) where instructors and
  course authors can build the course content that learners will consume.


* frontend-platform - This is a newer core system meant to ease the creation of
  multiple MFEs by bundling together many common utilities that all frontends 
  need.  This includes things like authentication workflows, logging,
  monitoring and translations related tooling.

Along with these two core systems, there exist a number of other `backend
services`_ and `MFEs`_ which can be found on GitHub.

Libraries
=========

In addition to the backends and frontends mentioned above, the platform is made
of numerous libraries that live in the `openedx`_ organization.
These libraries accomplish a variety of different tasks. More details about
what they do can be found in their READMEs.

Exceptions
**********
While the above summary covers most of the system, there are a few exceptions.


Non-Django Backends
===================
The `cs_comments_service`_ which provides discussion forum capability within the
platform is a legacy application that is written in Ruby, using the Sinatra
framework.

Non-React Frontends
===================
The Open edX Platform is currently still in the process of moving to React based
MFEs.  Previously frontend content used to be served by the Django services.
This means that there are still many parts of the system that use `Django
Template`_ based rendering pipelines to serve frontend content to users.

.. note::

   An exception to the exception.  In edx-platform rather than using the
   default Django templates, django is setup to use `Mako`_ based templates.

.. _Django: https://www.djangoproject.com/
.. _React: https://reactjs.org/
.. _openedx: https://github.com/openedx/
.. _edx-platform: https://github.com/openedx/edx-platform
.. _frontend-platform: https://github.com/openedx/frontend-platform
.. _backend services: https://github.com/orgs/openedx/repositories?q=topic%3Abackend-service&type=all&language=&sort=
.. _MFEs: https://github.com/orgs/openedx/repositories?q=frontend-app&type=all&language=&sort=
.. _cs_comments_service: https://github.com/openedx/cs_comments_service
.. _Django Template:
.. _Mako: https://www.makotemplates.org/