Chat-with-rendezvous: Lessons learned and problems

Help Kubo
1

Hi *,

I worked today on the chat-with-rendezvous of go-libp2p-examples. I would like to share my experiences and problems.

  • At first, I struggled a bit with the import having the IPFS references from more than one make install executions (ipfs, libp2p, …). Finally, I removed all and installed IPFS only :+1:.
    BTW: - does split the import path as well and the appropriate word can be used in the code.

  • For clarity and to loop over all peers to write to, I used two slices, one for read and one for write.

  • The part of the code which executes kadDht.FindProviders, loops over the returned peers, and opening new streams for writing was moved into an endless loop inside a goroutine. The already existing peers and write connections, respectively, were ignored.

  • The prompt was changed so that the sender is shown.

  • The default rendezvousString was replaced by a UUID

Finally, it was close to a real chat :grinning:

e.g. my last test with nine running chats:

Having a fresh UUID and after some time (~3min) all nine chats, I had started, can send messages and seven do receive from all other. So two chats had lost nearly all of their read connections.

Here the problems or challenges:

  • Although, the host has []ma.Multiaddr and the kadDht.Provide was successfull, the kadDht.FindProviders returns the appropriate peer without addresses (Issue #23)

  • If the chat is killed, new chats show errors related to the old peers, which are still returned from kadDht.FindProviders but can not be found anymore (Issue #24).

I hope, if I spread into the internet and start the chats not only on my laptop locally, it still works, or I will be able to fix it.

Tomorrow, I plan to refactor the code and make it presentable.

Comments or tips are appreciated.

Cheers, Stefan

1 Like
2

Hi *,

I have finished my prototype as a start.

Please, have a look at chat-with-rendezvous :smiley:.

Next steps will be around Protocol Multiplexing.

Comments or tips are appreciated.

Cheers, Stefan