Page index

1. Overview
2. Installing on Ubuntu
3. Installing on OS X
4. Configuration
   1. Stand-alone configuration
   2. Lobber web app configuration
   3. OS X specific configuration

Overview

A lobber storage node is essentially a standard BitTorrent client with a very thin layer used to receive notification about new and modified torrents. A lobber storage node is provided as a twisted plugin and is installed from the python package index. Currently the twisted plugin works with transmission - a popular, cross-platform BitTorrent client. Other BT clients may be supported in the future. Anchorinstallinstall

Installing

The examples below assume a debian/ubuntu and OS X environment. If you're running another unix-like or windows OS your milage may vary. Our goal is for lobber to run on a multitude of environments and operating systems. Please provide us with patches!

Installing on Ubuntu

Install Transmission

We recommend installing transmission 2.03 or later. If you are using Ubuntu 10.04 you may have to install transmission from a PPA:

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At this point you should have a transmission daemon running after each reboot. Use the /etc/init.d/transmission-daemon tool to stop/start the service in the normal way. Anchorinstallstoragenodeinstallstoragenode

Install lobber-storagenode

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pip install stompservice transmissionrpc feedparser

Get Download the tar archive lobber-storagenode-2.tar.gz or get the storage node from git.nordu.net:

git clone git@gitgit://git.nordu.net:/lobber-storagenode.git

Install the storagenode:

(for tar archive) tar xvzf lobber-storagenode-2-tar.gz
cd lobber-storagenode
python setup.py install

Installing on OS X

Install Transmission

Install Transmission for OS X and enable "Remote Access" in Preferences. We recommend installing transmission 2.03 or later.

Install lobber-storagenode

Download the tar archive lobber-storagenode-2.tar.gz or get the storage node from git.nordu.net:

git clone git://git.nordu.net/lobber-storagenode.git

Configuration

At this point twistd should have a new plugin registered. Verify this by running twistd --help and look for lobberstoragenode in the list of commands. If you see this then you're installation should be ok.

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$ twistd lobberstoragenode --help
Usage: twistd [options] lobberstoragenode [options]
Options:
  -n, --standardNotifications      Add standard notificiation destinations
  -R, --register                   Register new torrents with lobber
  -a, --announceUrl=               Announce URL (tracker) to use for new
                                   torrents
  -A, --acl=                       Access Control List to apply to new torrents
  -b, --dropbox=                   A directory to watch for new content
  -d, --torrentDir=                The directory where to store torrents
                                   [default: torrents]
  -D, --transmissionDownloadsDir=  The downloads directory for transmission
                                   [default:
                                   /var/lib/transmission-daemon/downloads]
  -h, --lobberHost=                The host running both STOMP and https for
                                   lobber
  -k, --lobberKey=                 The Lobber application key to use
  -p, --trackerProxyTrackerUrl=    Enable tracker proxying for given https
                                   tracker (HOST[:PORT])
  -P, --trackerProxyListenOn=      Adress to bind the tracker proxy to [default:
                                   localhost:8080]
  -r, --removeLimit=               Remove torrent and data when this many other
                                   storage-nodes have the data (0=never remove)
                                   [default: 0]
  -S, --stompUrl=                  The STOMP protocol URL to use for
                                   notifications
  -T, --transmissionRpc=           The RPC URL for transmission
      --version                    
      --help                       Display this help and exit.

Configuration

Stand-alone storage node

First you will have to create a key with the right entitlements to be able to access the torrents you are interested in. You do this in the Lobber web app under Application Keys.

Find the script lobberstoragenode configuration file config in the directory scripts in lobber-storagenode/etc/lobberstoragenode/.

You need to change the following options:

L_MODE="standalone"

L_KEY="[KEY]"
L_HOST="tracker.someserver.net"

L_TRACKERPROXYURL="https://tracker.someserver.net:443/tracker/uannounce"
L_TRACKERPROXYLISTEN="localhost:8080"
L_URLS="https://tracker.someserver.net/torrent/all.json ... ..."

Copy the script to the start up script folder and change permissions on it.

cp lobberstoragenode /etc/init.d/lobberstoragenode
chmod 755 /etc/init.d/lobberstoragenode

L_URLS is a set of STOMP destinations and/or RSS feeds. Each destination is pulled regularly and each link is downloaded. If the downloaded data is a BitTorrent file it is stored in the --torrentDir directory and added to transmission.

By default (L_STDNOTIFY="True") the standalone storage node will listen to stomp://tracker.someserver.net/torrent/new.

STOMP destinations

RSS URLs

Start the storage node:

/etc/init.d/lobberstoragenode standalone start start

To make the storagenode start automatically start on reboot run:

update-rc.d lobberstoragenode defaults

Storage node for Lobber web application

To start a storage node to complement the Lobber web application you need first to create a key with the right entitlements and url filter via the web ui.

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usermod -G debian-transmission www-data

To make transmission read files Find the configuration file config in the dropbox directory change ownership for it to debian-transmission and set the gid bit for the directory.

chown debian-transmission:debian-transmission /path/to/lobber/dropbox
chmod g+s /path/to/lobber/dropbox

Find the script lobberstoragenode in the directory scripts in lobber-storagenode/etc/lobberstoragenode/.

You need to change the following options:

L_MODE="webapp"

L_KEY="[KEY]"
L_HOST="localhost"

L_DROPBOXDIR="/path/to/lobber/dropbox"

Copy the script to the start up script folder and change permissions on it.

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The L_KEY is the lobber application key you obtain from lobber. The L_HOST should be 'beta.lobber.se' in order to use the Lobber Beta site and L_DROPBOXDIR is the path to a directory in your file system that will act as a dropbox. Any file or directory placed here will be uploaded to lobber and then removed.

Start the storage node:

/etc/init.d/lobberstoragenode webapp start

Unrevised old documentation

When running a storage-node for development purposes you will typically run it with both the --stompUrl and --lobberUrl parameters pointing to endpoints on your local development sandbox. When running a storage-node off of beta.lobber.se you will typically want to start it this wayTo make the storagenode start automatically start on reboot run:

# twistd -n lobberstoragenode -k <appkey> -h beta.lobber.se -d /var/torrents [<destination|rss>]*

The final arguments is a set of STOMP destinations and/or RSS feeds. Each RSS feed is pulled regularly and each link is downloaded. If the downloaded data is a BitTorrent file it is stored in the --torrentDir directory (/var/torrents in the example above). Optionally if a --script option was given it will be run as a command with the path to the torrent-file as an argument.

If you want to notify transmission of new torrents you might do something like this

# twistd -n lobberstoragenode ... --script="transmission-remote -n transmission:transmission -a"

A more complete example. This would regularly pull all torrents linked from https://beta.lobber.se/torrent/tag/foo.rssImage Removed and ask transmission to add the new ones.

# twistd -n lobberstoragenode -k <key> -h beta.lobber.se -d /tmp \\
         --script="transmission-remote -n transmission:transmission -a" \\
         https://beta.lobber.se/torrent/tag/foo.rss /torrent/tag/foo

Useful stuff to listen to for a storagenode

STOMP destinations

RSS URLs

...

Location

...

What it gets you

...

https://lobber.example.org/torrents/all.rss

...

All torrents readable by the current user (or key)

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https://lobber.example.org/torrents/tag/foo.rss

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update-rc.d lobberstoragenode defaults

OS X specific configuration

These are the changes that are needed to make the storage node work with the OS X version of Transmission.

L_TORRENTDIR="/Users/[username]/Downloads"
L_TRANSMISSIONDLDIR="/Users/[username]/Downloads"
L_TRANSMISSIONRPC="http://localhost:9091"
L_USER="[username]"
L_GROUP_PERM="staff"