defnax / RSNewWebUI

Web Interface for Retroshare

A web-based frontend for Retroshare. Communicates with the client through the JSON API.

Requirements

• Retroshare v0.6.5+ with JSON API enabled(see instructions below)
• A modern JavaScript-enabled web browser
• qmake(optional)

Installation

The web interface will be shipped by default in the next release of Retroshare once it gets merged. Until then, it needs to be installed separately.

Install WebUI

First, you need to download and install the web interface javascript code itself:

1. Clone the repo: You can clone using git, or download the zip file and extract it

git clone https://github.com/Retroshare/RSNewWebUI
cd RSNewWebUI

2. Build the files: If you have qmake installed, you just need to run it in the base directory:

qmake .

If you do not have qmake, go to webui-src/make-src/ and run the build script. Note that qmake is enough to do the build.

On Linux/MacOS:

cd webui-src/make-src
sh build.sh

On Windows:

cd webui-src\make-src\
./build.bat

Compile Retroshare with JSON API

If Retroshare needs to be compiled with non-default options as follows:

qmake CONFIG="debug rs_jsonapi rs_webui"
make

See the Retroshare repo for more detailed instructions. You should afterwards see a tab 'JSON API' and a tab 'Web Interface' in the Preferences.

Enable JSON API

You need to enable the JSON API, through which the web interface communicates with the client:

1. Open Retroshare, go to Preferences > JSON API.
2. Make sure the Enable Retroshare JSON API Server box is checked.

Enable Web Interface

1. Go to Preferences > Webinterface.
2. Make sure the Enable Retroshare WEB Interface box is checked.
3. Enter a password to protect access to the web interface.

If necessary, point the "Web interface directory" to the place where the webui files are compiled. This is usually RSNewWebUI/webui/

In any case, clock on "Apply settings" after editing this page. If everything goes ok, you should see a new token "webui:[your password]" in the JSonAPI page.

Usage

Open your browser to localhost:9092/index.html. Note that if you changed the port in the JSonAPI preferences pages, the port in this line needs to be changed accordingly.

The Web interface is only accessible from localhost (127.0.0.1). If you want to access the web interface of a headless retroshare server, then you need to create a SSH tunnel as follows:

ssh login@server -L 9092:localhost:9092 -N

After that, the webinterface of the Retroshare running on 'server' is tunneled to your local machine and accessible through localhost:9092.

Running a headless retroshare server is one possibility. The webinterface howeverdoes not allow you to create new nodes. Therefore the steps are:

1. Create a node using the standard Qt UI. That can be done in another machine.
2. Copy the retroshare data directory (.retroshare/ on linux) on the server.
3. On the server, launch a headless retroshare using that node:

./retroshare-service/src/retroshare-service -U list -W

and follow instructions to launch your profile (you need to choose a webui passord and enter the ID and login passord of your node).

References

• mithril
• list files with @jsonapi in libretroshare/src/retroshare of retroshare: grep -c "@jsonapi" *.h|grep -v ":0"

Contributing

Preparing code

Install prettier and eslint (required for linting & formatting code):

npm install -g prettier eslint

Next, run the following in the webui-src directory:

To run the linter: eslint app

To run the formatter: prettier -c app

Linting and formatting can also be done with editor/IDE plugins.

Bug Reports & Feature requests

Please create an issue concisely describing the bug you faced, or the feature you would like to see implemented.

Development

Whether you are a JavaScript developer or a web designer, you can help make the web interface better. Get in touch with us on the Developer forums in Retroshare.