Getting Started with LegoCity

Welcome to LegoCity! This guide will help you get up and running quickly.

What is LegoCity?

LegoCity is a Smart City Builder that provides a reusable foundation for building city dashboards and applications on top of FIWARE / NGSI-LD and modern web technologies.

Key Features

• 🏙️ Smart City Ready - Built on FIWARE/NGSI-LD standards
• 🗺️ Interactive Maps - Powered by Mapbox GL JS
• 📊 Flexible Dashboard - Configure with PayloadCMS
• 🔌 Extensible - Plugin architecture for custom features
• 🤖 AI-Powered - Optional AI assistance for content creation
• 🌍 Multi-tenant - Reusable across different cities

Core Components

LegoCity's 3-layer architecture: Data Sources, Smart City Context Broker, and Dashboard Management

Quick Start

Prerequisites

Before you begin, ensure you have:

• Node.js 18.x or later
• pnpm 8.x or later (package manager)
• MongoDB 6.x or later
• Git for version control

Installation Steps

1. Clone the repository

   git clone https://github.com/CTU-SematX/LegoCity.git
   cd LegoCity/dashboard

2. Install dependencies

   pnpm install

3. Configure environment

   cp .env.example .env

   Edit .env and set:

   DATABASE_URI=mongodb://127.0.0.1/legocity
   PAYLOAD_SECRET=your-secret-key-here
   NEXT_PUBLIC_SERVER_URL=http://localhost:3000

4. Start development server

   pnpm dev

5. Access the dashboard

   • Dashboard: http://localhost:3000
   • Admin Panel: http://localhost:3000/admin

Next Steps

After completing the quick start:

1. Complete Installation Guide - Detailed setup instructions
2. User Guide - Learn how to use LegoCity
3. Configuration - Configure data sources and APIs
4. Development Guide - Start building custom features

Architecture Overview

LegoCity is built on three main layers:

1. Context & Data Layer (FIWARE)

• NGSI-LD context brokers
• Smart Data Models
• Real-time sensor data

2. UI Layer (Next.js + PayloadCMS)

• Interactive map views (Mapbox)
• Dynamic dashboard configuration
• Content management

3. Integration Layer

• API proxies and security
• AI assistants (optional)
• External services

Community & Support

• 📖 Documentation: https://ctu-sematx.github.io/LegoCity
• 🐛 Issues: GitHub Issues
• 💬 Discussions: GitHub Discussions
• 📧 Contact: CTU-SematX Team

Design Principles

Context-Centric Design

City information is modeled as NGSI-LD entities in context brokers - the single source of truth.

Configuration-Driven UI

Dashboards are constructed from configurable blocks in PayloadCMS, not hard-coded.

Reusability

The same codebase works across multiple cities by changing configuration, not code.

AI as Optional

LegoCity works fully without AI. AI integration is a secondary feature for content authoring.

---

Ready to dive deeper? Continue to the Installation Guide for detailed setup instructions.