ipfs-cluster

Clustering for IPFS nodes.

WORK IN PROGRESS

DO NOT USE IN PRODUCTION

ipfs-cluster is a tool which groups a number of IPFS nodes together, allowing to collectively perform operations such as pinning.

In order to do so IPFS Cluster server nodes use a libp2p-based consensus algorithm (currently Raft) to agree on a log of operations and build a consistent state across the cluster. The state represents which objects should be pinned by which nodes.

Additionally, server nodes act as a proxy/wrapper to the IPFS API, so they can be used as a regular node, with the difference that pin requests are handled by the Cluster.

IPFS Cluster provides a server application (ipfscluster-server), a Go API, a HTTP API and a command-line tool (ipfscluster).

Current functionality only allows pinning in all cluster members, but more strategies (like setting a replication factor for each pin) will be developed.

Table of Contents

• Background
• Install
• Usage
• API
• Contribute
• License

Background

Since the start of IPFS it was clear that a tool to coordinate a number of different nodes (and the content they are supposed to store) would add a great value to the IPFS ecosystem. Naïve approaches are possible, but they present some weaknesses, specially at dealing with error handling, recovery and implementation of advanced pinning strategies.

ipfs-cluster aims to address this issues by providing a IPFS node wrapper which coordinates multiple cluster members via a consensus algorithm. This ensures that the desired state of the system is always agreed upon and can be easily maintained by the members of the cluster. Thus, every cluster member knows which content is tracked, can decide whether asking IPFS to pin it and can react to any contingencies like server reboots.

Install

In order to install the ipfscluster-server the ipfscluster tool simply download this repository and run make as follows:

$ go get -u -d github.com/ipfs/ipfs-cluster
$ cd $GOPATH/src/github.com/ipfs/ipfs-cluster
$ make install

This will install ipfscluster-server and ipfscluster in your $GOPATH/bin folder.

Usage

ipfscluster-server

ipfscluster-server runs a member node for the cluster. Usage information can be obtained running:

$ ipfscluster-server -h

Before running ipfscluster-server for the first time, initialize a configuration file with:

$ ipfscluster-server -init

The configuration will be placed in ~/.ipfs-cluster/server.json by default.

You can add the multiaddresses for the other members of the cluster in the cluster_peers variable. For example, here is a valid configuration for a cluster of 4 members:

{
    "id": "QmSGCzHkz8gC9fNndMtaCZdf9RFtwtbTEEsGo4zkVfcykD",
    "private_key" : "<redacted>",
    "cluster_peers" : [
          "/ip4/192.168.1.2/tcp/9096/ipfs/QmcQ5XvrSQ4DouNkQyQtEoLczbMr6D9bSenGy6WQUCQUBt",
          "/ip4/192.168.1.3/tcp/9096/ipfs/QmdFBMf9HMDH3eCWrc1U11YCPenC3Uvy9mZQ2BedTyKTDf",
          "/ip4/192.168.1.4/tcp/9096/ipfs/QmYY1ggjoew5eFrvkenTR3F4uWqtkBkmgfJk8g9Qqcwy51",
          "/ip4/192.168.1.5/tcp/9096/ipfs/QmSGCzHkz8gC9fNndMtaCZdf9RFtwtbTEEsGo4zkVfcykD"
        ],
    "cluster_addr": "0.0.0.0",
    "cluster_port": 9096,
    "consensus_data_folder": "/home/user/.ipfs-cluster/data",
    "api_addr": "0.0.0.0",
    "api_port": 9094,
    "ipfs_api_addr": "0.0.0.0",
    "ipfs_api_port": 9095,
    "ipfs_addr": "127.0.0.1",
    "ipfs_port": 5001
}

The configuration file should probably be identical among all cluster members, except for the id and private_key fields. To facilitate configuration, cluster_peers includes its own address, but it does not have to.

Once every cluster member has the configuration in place, you can run ipfscluster-server to start the cluster.

ipfscluster

ipfscluster is the client application to manage the cluster servers and perform actions. ipfscluster uses the HTTP API provided by the server nodes.

After installing, you can run ipfscluster --help to display general description and options, or alternatively ipfscluster help [cmd] to display information about supported commands.

In summary, it works as follows:

$ ipfscluster member ls                                                # list cluster members
$ ipfscluster pin add Qma4Lid2T1F68E3Xa3CpE6vVJDLwxXLD8RfiB9g1Tmqp58   # pins a Cid in the cluster
$ ipfscluster pin rm Qma4Lid2T1F68E3Xa3CpE6vVJDLwxXLD8RfiB9g1Tmqp58    # unpins a Cid from the cluster
$ ipfscluster status                                                   # display tracked Cids information
$ ipfscluster sync Qma4Lid2T1F68E3Xa3CpE6vVJDLwxXLD8RfiB9g1Tmqp58      # recover Cids in error status

Go

IPFS Cluster nodes can be launched directly from Go. The Cluster object provides methods to interact with the cluster and perform actions.

Documentation and examples on how to use IPFS Cluster from Go can be found in godoc.org/github.com/ipfs/ipfs-cluster.

API

TODO: Swagger

Contribute

PRs accepted.

Small note: If editing the README, please conform to the standard-readme specification.

License

MIT © Protocol Labs, Inc.