meta/comms/april-2018-grant.md

ButtCloud ⛅ 🌈

an April 2018 #ssbc-grants proposal

i'd like to work on better pub infrastructure and a hosted pub-as-a-service product.

team

me! 😺

goals

• we build an open source business on Scuttlebutt!
• a pub is your personal cloud device that is always available and publicly accessible
• a pub should be affordable (start pricing at ~$7/month per pub, try to get to ~$1/month per pub)
• we support open source infrastructure providers, like OVH and Catalyst
• the infrastructure code should easy for others to contribute and maintain

the story so far

pubs are important (1, 2, 3), but public pubs are a stop-gap we've used for too long, we need private pubs for everyone!

over the holidays, i got maybe 80% of the way towards automated Scuttlebutt pub infrastructure using Salt Stack, hosted on Open Stack using OVH public cloud. i've also been able to achieve mostly reliable pubs using an ssb-pub Docker image.

i want to throw away all the Salt Stack work i did and start over with Docker Swarm.

i expect this will take longer than a month of full-time work to complete.

sub-projects

there are three main sub-projects:

• provider service
• hub swarm
• pub service

architecture

• provider service
  • web app
    • join
      • land
      • sign in
      • create pub
      • pay for pub
      • start pub service
    • monitor
      • land
      • sign in
      • view pub
      • see stats
    • command
      • land
      • sign in
      • view pub
      • run command
  • web api
    • users
      • id
      • name
      • email
    • pub
      • bots
        • id
        • userId
        • name
        • status (up, down, none)
      • stats
        • stream Docker stats
      • commands
        • relay commands to pub services
      • orchestrator
        • on schedule, check what pubs are up
        • have 1 pub per 1 GB memory, 1 hub per 15 GB memory
        • queue worker jobs to ensure correct swarm
    • payment
      • products
      • plans
      • customers
      • subscriptions
  • swarm worker
    • manage hub machines
      • create hub
      • destroy hub
    • manage pub services
      • ensure pub service is up
      • ensure pub service is down
  • mailer worker
• pub service

stack

• provider service
  • web api
    • @feathersjs/socketio
    • @feathersjs/authentication
    • @feathersjs/authentication-jwt
    • feathers-stripe
    • node-resque
    • docker-remote-api
  • web app
    • next.js
    • ramda
    • @feathersjs/socketio-client
    • @feathersjs/authentication-client
    • react
    • react-hyperscript
    • recompose
    • fela
    • material-ui
    • react-stripe-elements
  • swarm worker
    • node-resque
    • docker-remote-api
  • mailer worker
    • node-resque
    • nodemailer
    • third-party: sendgrid
    • dev tool: maildev
• pub service
  • scuttlebot
  • ssb-viewer
  • git-ssb-web

roadmap

rough draft, subject to change

• upgrade pub service
  • update ssb-pub to use docker-compose (so we can host multiple Scuttlebutt processes in the same service)
    • add ssb-viewer
    • add git-ssb-web
• prototype hub swarm
  • setup single "hub manager" to be docker swarm manager
    • run mock provider service on manager
  • setup many "hub worker"s to be docker swarm workers
• create provider service
  • upgrade mock provider service to include postgres and redis databases
  • scaffold web api, web app, swarm worker, and mailer worker
  • implement provider web app user flows
• automate swarm
  • implement swarm orchestration functionality
• start business
  • understand costs, determine prices, forecast profit/loss
  • decide on company jurisdiction and legal structure
  • copy or create (with help) a Terms of Service & Privacy Policy