Pokemon Database

Created by Dan Peluso, Josh Alter, and Nithila Ramen for CS3200 at
Northeastern University

What is Pokemon Databse?

Pokemon Database (or Poke-Queue) is a simple front end user experience
for access to the Pokemon_db relational database written in MySQL. This
is the final project for CS3200 - Database Design at Northeastern
University. The project required us to make a database application and
build a database for it to work with. We decided to use Pokemon after
getting inspiration from all the data available online about various
Pokemon, games, generations, and much more. The show and game feature
a device called a 'Pokedex'

Getting Started

The app is comprised of 3 main components necessary for running the
Android app with a connection to the pokemonn DB.

• MySql Local Server
• Python Flask local web server
• Android Application

While more than a traditional Java application using the MySQL connector
to the database, this step was taken to further modularize the
project's dependencies. The Flask server routes GET requests made from URL to the MySQL Python drivers and returns the local server responses in JSON format for easy deserialization.

Setting Up the MySQL Database

Open the file PokemonDatabase/dbdump.4.12.sql in MySql workbench and start the local server. You will need your host username and password to connect to the local server. You will also need your private IP address, which can be found by typing the commend ipconfig in the terminal on any Windows machine. It will be listed under WiFi adapters next to the label 'IPv4'. Check to make sure the database is running on the server by refreshing the database. You should see the following:

Check to see the Pokemon table matches the following:

You are now ready to start the Python Flask server!

Setting Up the Python Flask Web Service

All the files associated with running the python script are located in PokemonDatabase/backend/. You need to change to variables in the app.py file to reflect the correct username and password to the MySQL server.

cnx = pymysql.connect(
        host='localhost',
        user="root",
        password="password",
        db='pokemon_db',
        charset='utf8mb4',
        cursorclass=pymysql.cursors.DictCursor)

You will need to set up an interpreter with the ability to import cryptography, Flask, and PyMySQL. To do this to our projects specification, use the command

pip install -r requirements.txt

Once these packages are installed, run the app.py file (ex. ‘Python app.py’ or ‘py -3 app.py’). If the server is running correctly, you will see the following text in the terminal:

To be sure the web service is running properly, we recommend typing the following link into a web browser and seeing if the proper response is presented.

http://127.0.0.1:5000/api/v1/database/g_all

All of our Database operations through the ORM API are returned in JSON format. This line queries our Pokemon table to return the following list of Pokemon objects:

[
  {
    "HP": 45, 
    "attack": 49, 
    "defense": 49, 
    "evolve_id": 2, 
    "generation": 1, 
    "idNum": 1, 
    "name": "Bulbasaur", 
    "special_attack": 65, 
    "special_defense": 65, 
    "speed": 45
  }, 
  {
    "HP": 60, 
    "attack": 62, 
    "defense": 63, 
    "evolve_id": 3, 
    "generation": 1, 
    "idNum": 2, 
    "name": "Ivysaur", 
    "special_attack": 80, 
    "special_defense": 80, 
    "speed": 60
  }, 
  {
    "HP": 80, 
    "attack": 100, 
    "defense": 123, 
    "evolve_id": 5, 
    "generation": 1, 
    "idNum": 3, 
    "name": "Venusaur", 
    "special_attack": 122, 
    "special_defense": 120, 
    "speed": 80
  }, 

This shows that the ORM is working, and displays the first 3 Pokemon in the database (conveniently the full evolution of Bulbasaur). You can test out any of the URL endpoints by typing them into your web browser while the local SQL server is running.

Using the Android Application

To install the Android App, the user can either open the full project in Android Studio or directly install the .apk from `PokemonDatabase/pokeMonDatabaseApp.apk.

Connecting

The most important piece of using the app is connecting to the local database before using any of the button functions. To do this, you must click the 'Connect' button at the bottom of the screen and enter in the IP address from the machine running the Python ORM and MySQL server.

The first screen of the app shows ‘Database not connected’ and indicates
that the other buttons being pressed may cause crashing of the app.

Selecting

To access filtered views of the Pokemon database, click on the select button on the main screen. The first screen will show the entire Pokemon database on a Recyclerview with some reduces stats. To filter the Pokemon, click on the button labeled 'Select Filter Term' and choose an option from the dropdown. Then, type your search term in the edit text and press the 'Search Database' button.

Creating / Updating / Deleting

The app allows for users to make modifications to the database with some simple user input on the main screen. The following diagram shows some of the buttons and input popups they release.

• Create
  • Pokemon
  • Trainer
  • Trainer to Pokemon
  • Generation
• Delete
  • Pokemon
  • Trainer
• Update
  • Trainer

Upon successful operation, a toast message will display at the bottom of
the screen notifying the user that the operation was successful.

Fighting

The final feature of our app is the simulated fighting of two Pokemon stored in the database using effectiveness, HP, and attack / defense. Clicking on the 'Fight' button launches the following activity. First, enter two Pokemon IDs in the input boxes at the top of the screen. Then, click the 'Get Pokemon from ID' button to see information about the two selected Pokemon. Finally, click the 'FIGHT' button to see who the winner of the simulated battle was!

Conclusions

Thanks to imgur user Lochewood for the Pikachu background used throughout the application, Veekun for the Evolution ID table values,. and to Armgilles for the main Pokemon database.