Chatangle Backend

The backend for Chatangle; a free, decentralized, global chatroom, powered by the IOTA tangle.

Installation Instructions

General Installation

For global installation:

npm install -g chatangle-backend

This will make Chatangle Backend available as the command chatangle-backend.

Installation Errors

If you get errors during install about bad permissions, your npm was probably installed as the root user. It is recommended to install npm as non-root, like with nvm. A workaround is to install with the --unsafe-perm flag like so:

npm install -g --unsafe-perm chatangle-backend

Usage

You must have a working IOTA Transaction Stream.

If globally installed, example:

chatangle-backend --iotaTransactionStreamIP 123.45.67.890 --iotaTransactionStreamPort 8008 --isIotaTransactionStreamSecured false --webSocketServerPort 8008

If installed locally or running from an IDE:

npm run start -- --iotaTransactionStreamIP 123.45.67.890 --iotaTransactionStreamPort 8008 --isIotaTransactionStreamSecured false --webSocketServerPort 8008

Running in the background, example:

nohup --iotaTransactionStreamIP 123.45.67.890 --iotaTransactionStreamPort 8008 --isIotaTransactionStreamSecured false --webSocketServerPort 8008 >> output.log &

Then tail the logs with

tail -f output.log

If PORT is specified in the environment, this will override webSocketServerPort

Hooking Into The Backend

These lines of Javascript can be copy-pasted into the Chrome console after starting the server locally to test if the backend is working:

let ws = new WebSocket('ws://chatangleBackendIP:8008')
ws.addEventListener('message', message => {console.log('message', message)})
ws.addEventListener('error', message => {console.error('error', message)})
ws.addEventListener('open', message => {console.log('open', message)})