LexForge

AI-powered demand-letter drafting for law firms — draft, collaborate on, and format legal demand letters with AI-assisted argument building, a reusable clause library, and court-rules-aware formatting.

781 tests · React 19 · TypeScript · Node/Express · Render

Live demo: lexforge-demo.onrender.com — demo mode: sign in with any email/password. Documents and clauses are bundled fixture data; AI suggestions are live (OpenRouter free-tier models via the API's rate-limited endpoint — the first call after idle may take ~30–60s while the free-tier server wakes).

Walkthrough: sign in, browse drafts, edit in the legal editor, insert from the clause library, add Bluebook-formatted citations, apply AI suggestions, and review the audit trail.

Features

• AI argument builder — generate structured legal arguments (introduction, numbered arguments, conclusion) from case facts, with AI suggestions to strengthen weak points
• AI clause suggestions — context-aware clause recommendations while drafting
• Clause library — reusable, categorized clauses with usage tracking and one-click insertion
• Citation manager — format and insert legal citations (Bluebook-style formatting)
• Court-rules formatting — brief & pleading formatting driven by a court-rules database (margins, captions, line numbering per jurisdiction)
• Real-time collaboration — live cursors, selections, and presence sync across editors; document sharing with role-based invitations and revocable share links
• Audit logging — every document event recorded and reportable, built for legal-compliance review

Tech stack

Layer	Technology
Frontend	React 19, TypeScript, Vite, Redux Toolkit, Tiptap (ProseMirror), Tailwind CSS
API server	Node.js, Express, JWT auth, Socket.IO (real-time)
Database	PostgreSQL via Prisma ORM, hosted on Neon
AI	OpenRouter, called from the server's AI generate endpoint
Hosting	Render — static site (frontend) + web service (API)
Testing	Vitest + Testing Library (frontend), Vitest + Supertest (server) — 781 tests across 57 files

Architecture

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  React SPA (Vite + Redux Toolkit + Tiptap)  │
│  editor · clause library · citations · args │
└──────────────┬──────────────────────────────┘
               │ VITE_API_URL (REST + WebSocket)
               ▼
┌───────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  API server (Node/Express)                     │
│  auth (JWT) · REST data · AI generate · Socket.IO │
└──────────────┬──────────────────────┬─────────┘
               │                      │
               ▼                      ▼
       ┌───────────────┐      ┌──────────────┐
       │ Postgres (Neon)│      │ OpenRouter   │
       └───────────────┘      └──────────────┘

Real-time collaboration rides Socket.IO: presence and cursor updates are throttled client-side and fanned out to all sessions on a document.

Live demo

The hosted demo (demo mode) serves bundled fixture data — no database and no real accounts — while AI suggestions call the live API (free-tier models, rate-limited and capped). Sign in with any email and password to explore the full UI.

Local setup

git clone https://github.com/franciszver/lexforge.git
cd lexforge
npm install
VITE_DEMO_MODE=1 npm run dev   # demo mode: fixture data, no backend required

To run against a local API server instead:

cd server
cp .env.example .env   # fill in DATABASE_URL, JWT_SECRET, OPENROUTER_API_KEY
npm install
npx prisma generate
npm run dev

VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:3001 npm run dev

Details in docs/SETUP.md.

npx vitest run          # frontend: 541 tests
cd server && npm test   # server: 240 tests
npm run build            # production build

License

MIT — see LICENSE.