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Coldflow — Take-Home Assignment

Welcome, and thanks for taking the time. This exercise mirrors the real day-to-day of working on Coldflow: clone the repo, pick up open GitHub issues, ship a PR.

What you're building

Coldflow is an open-source cold email tool (Next.js 15 + Payload CMS 3 + Postgres). You'll resolve two open issues in a single pull request against main:

  1. #4 — actually be able to send emails

    Right now the Google OAuth config is too confusing to get it wired up where it works for sending emails.

  2. #5 — CF-1: Eazy — be able to upload a contact list

    The list of leads, that we are sequencing outreach to, should have the ability to upload a CSV.

Time budget

Aim for ~4–6 hours. If you hit the ceiling, stop and document what's left in the PR description — we'd rather see a clean, honest cut-off than a rushed finish.

Setup

Prereqs: Node 20+, pnpm, Docker + Docker CLI.

Install pnpm (pick one):

corepack enable && corepack prepare pnpm@latest --activate   # easiest if you have Node 20+
# or
npm install -g pnpm
# or (macOS)
brew install pnpm

Install Docker:

  • macOS / Windows: install Docker Desktop — includes the Docker CLI and Compose. Launch it once so the daemon is running.
  • Linux: follow the Docker Engine install guide for your distro, then sudo systemctl start docker.

Verify both are working:

pnpm -v && docker info > /dev/null && echo "ready"

Run the app:

git clone https://github.com/pypesdev/coldflow.git
cd coldflow
cp .env.example .env   # fill in the values you need (see issue #4)
pnpm i
docker compose up -d db
pnpm dev

Open http://localhost:3000.

CI runs on every PR (.github/workflows/ci.yml):

  • pnpm exec tsc --noEmit
  • pnpm lint
  • pnpm test:int

Your PR must be green.

Scope

Issue #4 — Google OAuth → sending works end-to-end

A new contributor should be able to clone the repo, follow the README, connect their Google account, and successfully send a test email from a campaign.

Expectations:

  • Document the exact Google Cloud setup (OAuth client type, redirect URIs, scopes, consent screen state) in the README or a docs/ page. Screenshots welcome.
  • Make the required .env keys obvious in .env.example with comments on where each value comes from.
  • Fix any code-level friction you hit (bad error messages, missing scopes, broken redirect handling, token refresh, etc.). Root-cause it — don't paper over it.
  • Verify the send path actually works against a real Gmail account before declaring done.

Issue #5 — CSV upload for contact lists

Users should be able to upload a CSV of leads and have those leads attached to a campaign for sequencing.

Expectations:

  • A clear UI entry point on the leads/contacts surface (wherever it belongs given existing patterns).
  • Reasonable column mapping: at minimum email, first_name, last_name. Bonus for arbitrary columns flowing through to template variables.
  • Validate rows: skip/report invalid emails, dedupe within the file and against existing contacts.
  • Give the user feedback: how many imported, how many skipped, and why.
  • Handle a 1k-row file without falling over. You don't need to design for 1M.

Ground rules

  • One PR, targeting main. Title: take-home: <your name>.
  • Write code in the style of the existing codebase. Don't restructure things that aren't in your way.
  • Tests where they add real signal (parsing logic, validation, OAuth token handling). Don't pad coverage.
  • Keep commits coherent — we read history.
  • If you make a non-obvious tradeoff, call it out in the PR description.

What we evaluate

Area What good looks like
Problem framing You understood what the issue actually meant, not just the literal words
Code quality Reads cleanly, fits the codebase, no dead code or speculative abstractions
Correctness The send works. The CSV import works. Edge cases considered
Developer experience A teammate could pick up your changes tomorrow without asking you questions
Communication PR description tells us what, why, and what you'd do next

Submitting

  1. Push your branch to a fork.
  2. Open a PR against pypesdev/coldflow:main.
  3. In the PR description include:
    • A short summary per issue
    • How you tested (the actual steps, including a screenshot or short clip of a send going through and a CSV import succeeding)
    • Anything you'd do with another day
  4. Reply to the email thread with the PR link.

Questions during the exercise are fine — ask. We'd rather unblock you than watch you guess.

Good luck.