Deploying to Render

GeoLens is hosted on Render as two separate services:

Service	Type	Domain
Main Application	Web Service	geo-lens.net
Documentation	Static Site	docs.geo-lens.net

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Main Application (Web Service)

Configuration

Setting	Value
Environment	Node
Build Command	npm install
Start Command	node server/server.js
Port	Auto-detected from $PORT environment variable

Environment Variables

Set all required environment variables in the Render dashboard under Environment. See Environment Variables for the full list.

For Firebase credentials in production, use FIREBASE_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_JSON (paste the entire service account JSON as a single-line string). Avoid using file paths in production.

Auto-Deploy

Connect the Render service to the GitHub repository (UrbanDigitalTwin/Cesium_App). Render will automatically redeploy on every push to the configured branch (typically main).

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Documentation Site (Static Site)

Configuration

Setting	Value
Build Command	cd geo-lens-docs && npm install && npm run build
Publish Directory	geo-lens-docs/build

No environment variables are needed for the documentation site.

Custom Domain

In the Render dashboard for the static site service:

1. Go to Settings → Custom Domains
2. Add docs.geo-lens.net
3. Create a CNAME record at your DNS provider pointing docs → the Render-provided DNS name

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Health Checks

Render performs HTTP health checks on the web service. The default health check path is /. The Express server responds to this with index.html, which is sufficient.

Logs

Access application logs from the Render dashboard under Logs. The server logs all incoming requests with timestamps, which aids in debugging API proxy failures.

Scaling

The free tier of Render spins down the web service after 15 minutes of inactivity. The first request after spin-down takes ~30 seconds (cold start). For production workloads, upgrade to a paid plan with "Always On" enabled.