dendrite/docs/p2p.md

Peer-to-peer Matrix

These are the instructions for setting up P2P Dendrite, current as of May 2020. There's both Go stuff and JS stuff to do to set this up.

Dendrite

Build

• The main branch has a WASM-only binary for dendrite: ./cmd/dendritejs.
• Build it and copy assets to riot-web.

$ ./build-dendritejs.sh
$ cp bin/main.wasm ../riot-web/src/vector/dendrite.wasm

Test

To check that the Dendrite side is working well as Wasm, you can run the Wasm-specific tests:

$ ./test-dendritejs.sh

Rendezvous

This is how peers discover each other and communicate.

By default, Dendrite uses the Matrix-hosted websocket star relay server at TODO /dns4/ws-star.discovery.libp2p.io/tcp/443/wss/p2p-websocket-star. This is currently hard-coded in ./cmd/dendritejs/main.go - you can also use a local one if you run your own relay:

$ npm install --global libp2p-websocket-star-rendezvous
$ rendezvous --port=9090 --host=127.0.0.1

Then use /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/9090/ws/p2p-websocket-star/.

Riot-web

You need to check out this repo:

$ git clone git@github.com:matrix-org/go-http-js-libp2p.git

Make sure to yarn install in the repo. Then:

• $ cp "$(go env GOROOT)/misc/wasm/wasm_exec.js" ./src/vector/
• Comment out the lines in wasm_exec.js which contains:

if (!global.fs && global.require) {
    global.fs = require("fs");
}

• Add the diff at https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/compare/matthew/p2p?expand=1 - ignore the package.json stuff.
• Add the following symlinks: they HAVE to be symlinks as the diff in webpack.config.js references specific paths.

$ cd node_modules
$ ln -s ../../go-http-js-libp2p

NB: If you don't run the server with yarn start you need to make sure your server is sending the header Service-Worker-Allowed: /.

TODO: Make a Docker image with all of this in it and a volume mount for dendrite.wasm.

Running

You need a Chrome and a Firefox running to test locally as service workers don't work in incognito tabs.

• For Chrome, use chrome://serviceworker-internals/ to unregister/see logs.
• For Firefox, use about:debugging#/runtime/this-firefox to unregister. Use the console window to see logs.

Assuming you've yarn started Riot-Web, go to http://localhost:8080 and register with http://localhost:8080 as your HS URL.

You can:

• join rooms by room alias e.g /join #foo:bar.
• invite specific users to a room.
• explore the published room list. All members of the room can re-publish aliases (unlike Synapse).