Cmd/API.md

API

The API is intended to be used by a local full standalone client that provides a frontend for the end-user. The API allows to use Peernet effectively; it provides functions to share files, search for content and download files.

Note: This API code is likely to be moved into the core soon.

Use considerations

It is not intended to be directly used in a legacy web browser, and shall not be exposed to the internet. It shall only run on a loopback IP such as 127.0.0.1 or ::1. Special HTTP headers (including the Access-Control headers) are intentionally not set.

The API is currently unauthenticated and intentionally provides direct access to the users blockchain.

Notes

The API is still in development and endpoints are subject to change. The API should be currently only used for debugging and early phase development purposes.

Configuration

The configuration file (default Config.yaml) contains settings for the API. To listen on http://127.0.0.1:112/ add this line:

APIListen: ["127.0.0.1:112"]

Overview

These are the functions provided by the API:

/status                     Provides current connectivity status to the network
/peer/self                  Provides information about the self peer details
/share/list                 List all files and directories that are shared
/share/file                 Share a file via the peers blockchain

/search                     Search Peernet for a file based on keywords or hash
/download/start             Download a file based on a hash
/download/status            Get the status of a download

/status/ws                  Starts a websocket to receive updates on operations immediately (push instead of pull)
/console                    Console provides a websocket to send/receive internal commands

/blockchain/self/header     Header of the blockchain
/blockchain/self/append     Append a block to the blockchain
/blockchain/self/read       Read a block of the blockchain
/blockchain/self/add/file   Add file to the blockchain
/blockchain/self/list/file  List all files stored on the blockchain

The /share functions are providing high-level functionality to work with files. The /blockchain functions provide low-level functionality which is typically not needed.

Status

This function informs about the current connection status of the client to the network. Additional fields will be added in the future.

Request:    GET /status

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiResponseStatus

type apiResponseStatus struct {
	Status        int  `json:"status"`        // Status code: 0 = Ok.
	IsConnected   bool `json:"isconnected"`   // Whether connected to Peernet.
	CountPeerList int  `json:"countpeerlist"` // Count of peers in the peer list. Note that this contains peers that are considered inactive, but have not yet been removed from the list.
	CountNetwork  int  `json:"countnetwork"`  // Count of total peers in the network.
	// This is usually a higher number than CountPeerList, which just represents the current number of connected peers.
	// The CountNetwork number is going to be queried from root peers which may or may not have a limited view into the network.
}

Self Information

This function returns information about the current peer.

Request:    GET /peer/self

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiResponsePeerSelf

The peer and node IDs are encoded as hex encoded strings.

type apiResponsePeerSelf struct {
	PeerID string `json:"peerid"` // Peer ID. This is derived from the public in compressed form.
	NodeID string `json:"nodeid"` // Node ID. This is the blake3 hash of the peer ID and used in the DHT.
}

Console

The /console websocket allows to execute internal commands. This should be only used for debugging purposes by the end-user. The same input and output as raw text as via the command-line is provided through this endpoint.

Request:    ws://127.0.0.1:112/console

Blockchain Self Header

This function returns information about the current peer. It is not required that a peer has a blockchain. If no data is shared, there are no blocks. The blockchain does not formally have a header as each block has the same structure.

Request:    GET /blockchain/self/header

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiBlockchainHeader

type apiBlockchainHeader struct {
	PeerID  string `json:"peerid"`  // Peer ID hex encoded.
	Version uint64 `json:"version"` // Current version number of the blockchain.
	Height  uint64 `json:"height"`  // Height of the blockchain (number of blocks). If 0, no data exists.
}

Blockchain Append Block

This appends a block to the blockchain. This is a low-level function for already encoded blocks. Do not use this function. Adding invalid data to the blockchain may corrupt it which subsequently might result in blacklisting by other peers.

Request:    POST /blockchain/self/append with JSON structure apiBlockchainBlockRaw

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiBlockchainBlockStatus

type apiBlockRecordRaw struct {
	Type uint8  `json:"type"` // Record Type. See core.RecordTypeX.
	Data []byte `json:"data"` // Data according to the type.
}

type apiBlockchainBlockRaw struct {
	Records []apiBlockRecordRaw `json:"records"` // Block records in encoded raw format.
}

type apiBlockchainBlockStatus struct {
	Status  int    `json:"status"`  // Status: 0 = Success, 1 = Error invalid data
	Version uint64 `json:"version"` // Current version number of the blockchain.
	Height  uint64 `json:"height"`  // Height of the blockchain (number of blocks).
}

Blockchain Read Block

This reads a block of the current peer.

Request:    GET /blockchain/self/read?block=[number]

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiBlockchainBlock

type apiBlockchainBlock struct {
	Status            int                 `json:"status"`            // Status: 0 = Success, 1 = Error block not found, 2 = Error block encoding (indicates that the blockchain is corrupt)
	PeerID            string              `json:"peerid"`            // Peer ID hex encoded.
	LastBlockHash     []byte              `json:"lastblockhash"`     // Hash of the last block. Blake3.
	BlockchainVersion uint64              `json:"blockchainversion"` // Blockchain version
	Number            uint64              `json:"blocknumber"`       // Block number
	RecordsRaw        []apiBlockRecordRaw `json:"recordsraw"`        // Records raw. Successfully decoded records are parsed into the below fields.
	RecordsDecoded    []interface{}       `json:"recordsdecoded"`    // Records decoded. The encoding for each record depends on its type.
}

The array RecordsDecoded will contain any present record of the following:

• Profile records, see apiBlockRecordProfile
• File records, see apiBlockRecordFile

type apiBlockRecordProfile struct {
	Fields []apiBlockRecordProfileField `json:"fields"` // All fields
	Blobs  []apiBlockRecordProfileBlob  `json:"blobs"`  // Blobs
}

type apiBlockRecordProfileField struct {
	Type uint16 `json:"type"` // See ProfileFieldX constants.
	Text string `json:"text"` // The data
}

type apiBlockRecordProfileBlob struct {
	Type uint16 `json:"type"` // See ProfileBlobX constants.
	Data []byte `json:"data"` // The data
}

type apiBlockRecordFile struct {
	ID          uuid.UUID         `json:"id"`          // Unique ID.
	Hash        []byte            `json:"hash"`        // Blake3 hash of the file data
	Type        uint8             `json:"type"`        // Type (low-level)
	Format      uint16            `json:"format"`      // Format (high-level)
	Size        uint64            `json:"size"`        // Size of the file
	Folder      string            `json:"folder"`      // Folder, optional
	Name        string            `json:"name"`        // Name of the file
	Description string            `json:"description"` // Description. This is expected to be multiline and contain hashtags!
	Metadata    []apiFileMetadata `json:"metadata"`    // Metadata. These are decoded tags.
	TagsRaw     []apiFileTagRaw   `json:"tagsraw"`     // All tags encoded that were not recognized as metadata.

	// The following known tags from the core library are decoded into metadata or other fields in above structure; everything else is a raw tag:
	// TagTypeName, TagTypeFolder, TagTypeDescription, TagTypeDateCreated
	// The caller can specify its own metadata fields and fill the TagsRaw structure when creating a new file. It will be returned when reading the files' data.
}

type apiFileMetadata struct {
	Type  uint16 `json:"type"`  // See core.TagTypeX constants.
	Name  string `json:"name"`  // User friendly name of the tag. Use the Type fields to identify the metadata as this name may change.
	Value string `json:"value"` // Text value of the tag.
}

type apiFileTagRaw struct {
	Type uint16 `json:"type"` // See core.TagTypeX constants.
	Data []byte `json:"data"` // Data
}

Blockchain Add File

This adds a file with the provided information to the blockchain.

Request:    POST /blockchain/self/add/file with JSON structure apiBlockAddFiles

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiBlockchainBlockStatus

type apiBlockAddFiles struct {
	Files []apiBlockRecordFile `json:"files"`
}

type apiBlockchainBlockStatus struct {
	Status int    `json:"status"` // Status: 0 = Success, 1 = Error invalid data
	Height uint64 `json:"height"` // New height of the blockchain (number of blocks).
}

Example POST request data to http://127.0.0.1:112/blockchain/self/add/file:

{
    "files": [{
        "id": "236de31d-f402-4389-bdd1-56463abdc309",
        "hash": "aFad3zRACbk44dsOw5sVGxYmz+Rqh8ORDcGJNqIz+Ss=",
        "type": 1,
        "format": 10,
        "size": 4,
        "name": "Test.txt",
        "folder": "sample directory/sub folder",
        "description": "",
        "metadata": [],
        "tagsraw": []
    }]
}

Another example to create a new file but with a new arbitrary tag with type number 100 set to "test" and setting the metadata field "Date Created" (which is type 2 = core.TagTypeDateCreated):

{
    "files": [{
        "id": "bc32cbae-011d-4f0b-80a8-281ca93692e7",
        "hash": "aFad3zRACbk44dsOw5sVGxYmz+Rqh8ORDcGJNqIz+Ss=",
        "type": 1,
        "format": 10,
        "size": 4,
        "name": "Test.txt",
        "folder": "sample directory/sub folder",
        "description": "Example description\nThis can be any text #newfile #2021.",
        "metadata": [{
        "type": 2,
            "value": "2021-08-28 00:00:00"
        }],
        "tagsraw":  [{
            "type": 100,
            "data": "dGVzdA=="
        }]
    }]
}

Blockchain List Files

This lists all files stored on the blockchain.

Request:    GET /blockchain/self/list/file

Response:   200 with JSON structure apiBlockAddFiles

Example output:

{
    "files": [{
        "id": "a59b6465-fe8c-4a61-9fcc-fe37cf711fd4",
        "hash": "aFad3zRACbk44dsOw5sVGxYmz+Rqh8ORDcGJNqIz+Ss=",
        "type": 1,
        "format": 10,
        "size": 4,
        "folder": "sample directory/sub folder",
        "name": "Test.txt",
        "description": "",
        "metadata": [{
            "type": 2,
            "name": "Date Shared",
            "value": "2021-08-27 16:59:13"
        }],
        "tagsraw": []
    }],
    "status": 0
}