README.md

February 1, 2020 ยท View on GitHub

Project Status

Currently the frontend application is completed.

The server is retrieving network data from the (PolkadotJS API)[https://polkadot.js.org/api/METHODS_RPC.html#system]. The original intent was to implement a LibP2P based node crawler to get a statistical snapshot of the nodes in the Polkadot network.

Infrastructure Overview

  • Redis for data storage
  • Node.js GraphQL server using apollo-server and apollo-shield
  • Uses GraphQl subscription support manage real time communications over web socket transport
  • Currently retrieves the network info via the PolkadotJS API
  • Uses MaxMind GeoIP lite for offline resolution
  • Client application is built as a single page application using react and apollo-client

Development

To develop using a Docker environment:

  • It's designed to be deployed on a single machine. For example, on EC2 managed by Elastic Beanstalk.
  • We've also provided a docker-compose.yml as an example to use in development.
  • Ensure that the environment variable POLKADOT_HOST in server/src/constants/index.ts has a working endpoint. By default it's set to use wss://poc3-rpc.polkadot.io

Start the server

cd server
npm run docker-build
npm run docker

Start the client

cd client
npm start

Deployment

The client is a single page application and can be deployed on any static site hosting service such as:

  • AWS S3 Hosting + Cloudfront, Firebase Hosting, Netlify etc.

The server is setup as a single Docker container and can be hosted using any Cloud platform that supports Docker

  • AWS Elastic Beanstalk, Heroku or Google App Engine.