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make README a bit more comprehensive and rename example/ as experiments/

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Matthew Hodgson
2014-08-12 19:36:36 +01:00
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README.rst
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@@ -1,14 +1,96 @@
About
=====
Matrix is an ambitious new ecosystem for open federated Instant Messaging and VoIP[1].
Matrix specifies a set of pragmatic RESTful HTTP JSON APIs as an open standard, providing:
- Creating and managing fully distributed chat rooms with no
single points of control or failure
- Eventually-consistent cryptographically secure synchronisation of room
state across a global open network of federated servers and services
- Sending and receiving extensible messages in a room with (optional)
end-to-end encryption[2]
- Inviting, joining, leaving, kicking, banning room members
- Managing user accounts (registration, login, logout)
- Using 3rd Party IDs (3PIDs) such as email addresses, phone numbers,
Facebook accounts to authenticate, identify and discover users on Matrix.
- Placing 1:1 VoIP and Video calls (in development)
These APIs are intended to be implemented on a wide range of servers, services
and clients which then form the Matrix ecosystem, and allow developers to build
messaging and VoIP functionality on top of the open Matrix community rather than
using closed or proprietary solutions. The hope is for Matrix to act as the
building blocks for a new generation of fully open and interoperable messaging
and VoIP apps for the internet.
Synapse is a reference "homeserver" implementation of Matrix from the core
development team at matrix.org, written in Python/Twisted for clarity and
simplicity. It is intended to showcase the concept of Matrix and let folks see
the spec in the context of a codebase and let you run your own homeserver and
generally help bootstrap the ecosystem.
In Matrix, every user runs one or more Matrix clients, which connect through to
a Matrix homeserver which stores all their personal chat history and user
account information - much as a mail client connects through to an IMAP/SMTP
server. Just like email, you can either run your own Matrix homeserver and
control and own your own communications and history or use one hosted by someone
else (e.g. matrix.org) - there is no single point of control or mandatory
service provider in Matrix, unlike WhatsApp, Facebook, Hangouts, etc.
Synapse ships with two basic demo Matrix clients: webclient (a basic group chat web client demo implemented in AngularJS) and cmdclient (a basic Python commandline utility which lets you easily see what the JSON APIs are up to).
We'd like to invite you to take a look at the Matrix spec, try to run a homeserver, and join the existing Matrix chatrooms already out there, experiment with the APIs and the demo clients, and let us know your thoughts at https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/issues or at matrix@matrix.org.
Thanks for trying Matrix!
[1] VoIP currently in development
[2] End-to-end encryption is currently in development
Directory Structure
===================
::
.
├── cmdclient Basic CLI python Matrix client
├── demo Scripts for running standalone Matrix demos
├── docs All doc, including the draft Matrix API spec
│   ├── client-server The client-server Matrix API spec
│   ├── model Domain-specific elements of the Matrix API spec
│   ├── server-server The server-server model of the Matrix API spec
│   └── sphinx The internal API doc of the Synapse homeserver
├── experiments Early experiments of using Synapse's internal APIs
├── graph Visualisation of Matrix's distributed message store
├── synapse The reference Matrix homeserver implementation
│   ├── api Common building blocks for the APIs
│   │   ├── events Definition of state representation Events
│   │   └── streams Definition of streamable Event objects
│   ├── app The __main__ entry point for the homeserver
│   ├── crypto The PKI client/server used for secure federation
│   │   └── resource PKI helper objects (e.g. keys)
│   ├── federation Server-server state replication logic
│   ├── handlers The main business logic of the homeserver
│   ├── http Wrappers around Twisted's HTTP server & client
│   ├── rest Servlet-style RESTful API
│   ├── storage Persistence subsystem (currently only sqlite3)
│   │   └── schema sqlite persistence schema
│   └── util Synapse-specific utilities
├── tests Unit tests for the Synapse homeserver
└── webclient Basic AngularJS Matrix web client
Installation
============
[TODO(kegan): I also needed libffi-dev, which I don't think is included in build-essential.]
First, the dependencies need to be installed. Start by installing
'python2.7-dev' and the various tools of the compiler toolchain.
First, the dependencies need to be installed. Start by installing 'python-dev'
and the various tools of the compiler toolchain:
N.B. that python 2.x where x >= 7 is required.
Installing prerequisites on ubuntu::
$ sudo apt-get install build-essential python-dev
$ sudo apt-get install build-essential python2.7-dev libffi-dev
Installing prerequisites on Mac OS X::
@@ -35,12 +117,13 @@ This should end with a 'PASSED' result::
PASSED (successes=143)
Running The Home Server
=======================
Running The Synapse Homeserver
==============================
In order for other home servers to send messages to your server, they will need
to know its host name. You have two choices here, which will influence the form
of your user IDs:
In order for other homeservers to send messages to your server, it will need to
be publicly visible on the internet, and they will need to know its host name.
You have two choices here, which will influence the form of your matrix user
IDs:
1) Use the machine's own hostname as available on public DNS in the form of its
A or AAAA records. This is easier to set up initially, perhaps for testing,
@@ -58,10 +141,9 @@ For the first form, simply pass the required hostname (of the machine) as the
For the second form, first create your SRV record and publish it in DNS. This
needs to be named _matrix._tcp.YOURDOMAIN, and point at at least one hostname
and port where the server is running. (At the current time we only support a
single server, but we may at some future point support multiple servers, for
backup failover or load-balancing purposes). The DNS record would then look
something like::
and port where the server is running. (At the current time synapse does not
support clustering multiple servers into a single logical homeserver). The DNS
record would then look something like::
_matrix._tcp IN SRV 10 0 8448 machine.my.domain.name.
@@ -73,9 +155,13 @@ SRV record, as that is the name other machines will expect it to have::
You may additionally want to pass one or more "-v" options, in order to
increase the verbosity of logging output; at least for initial testing.
For the initial alpha release, the homeserver is not speaking TLS for
either client-server or server-server traffic for ease of debugging. We have
also not spent any time yet getting the homeserver to run behind loadbalancers.
Running The Web Client
======================
Running The Demo Web Client
===========================
At the present time, the web client is not directly served by the homeserver's
HTTP server. To serve this in a form the web browser can reach, arrange for the
@@ -92,6 +178,7 @@ HTML5 local storage to remember its config), you will need to log in to your
account. If you don't yet have an account, because you've just started the
homeserver for the first time, then you'll need to register one.
Registering A New Account
-------------------------
@@ -103,7 +190,10 @@ account. Your name will take the form of::
(pronounced "at localpart on my dot domain dot here")
Specify your desired localpart in the topmost box of the "Register for an
account" form, and click the "Register" button.
account" form, and click the "Register" button. Hostnames can contain ports if
required due to lack of SRV records (e.g. @matthew:localhost:8080 on an internal
synapse sandbox running on localhost)
Logging In To An Existing Account
---------------------------------