Mesh Media

Mesh Media is a project by the Hypha Worker Co-operative.

The software and guides make it easy to host community nodes using available hardware for disseminating multimedia content across our decentralized web ecosystems. This work draws heavily from ongoing work by Toronto Mesh and is tailored toward specific use-cases.

A Mesh Media node currently configures a Raspberry Pi to start up an Access Point, where other devices can connect to watch video content available on the IPFS network through their web browser by simply providing a Content Identifier (CID). While connected to the Internet, the node can seed content to the IPFS network, but while offline a connected device can play content that is already stored on the Raspberry Pi. The player has been tested on desktop and mobile devices and currently supports playback of MPEG-4 and HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) content, with timecode and CID-based bookmark features.

Future steps may include off-Internet distribution via local mesh networks and using other distributed content networks such as Dat.

Set Up

1. You need to have a Raspberry Pi 3B+ or 4, and a microSD card.

2. Flash the microSD card with Raspbian Buster Lite. You can use a tool like Etcher.

3. Create an empty file named ssh to enable SSH when the Pi boots:

   $ touch /path/to/sd/boot/ssh
   

4. Plug the Pi into your router so it has connectivity to the Internet. SSH into the Pi with ssh pi@raspberrypi.local and password raspberry.

   Optional: There are other ways to connect, such as connecting the Pi to your computer and sharing Internet with it. If you have multiple Pis connected to your router, find their IPs with nmap -sn 192.168.X.0/24 (where 192.168.X is your subnet) and SSH to the local IP assigned to the Pi you want to connect to ssh pi@192.168.X.Y.

5. In your SSH session, run passwd and change your login password. It is very important to choose a strong password so others cannot access the Pi.

6. Run the following to install Mesh Media:

   $ wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hyphacoop/meshmedia/master/install && chmod +x install && ./install
   

   Wait for the installation to complete. Your Raspberry Pi will reboot with the new hostname meshmedia and you can now connect to it at ssh pi@meshmedia.local.

7. Nearby devices can now connect to the new Access Point named meshmedia and watch videos on the IPFS network using its CID. For example, you can watch A technical introduction to IPFS by Hector Sanjuan with the URL http://10.0.0.1/?vod=QmNtQiSK7dZbMCH89kgBLzgfMQP3UoWqT2QKWvjtVt2jTx. You can try this with any video from the Our Networks archive, and many others on the Internet, by replacing the CID in the URL.

HLS Content

In addition to mp4 files, Mesh Media can also play HLS playlists commonly used for live streamed content. For example, SSH into the Pi at ssh pi@meshmedia.local and download the Our Networks 2019 live stream archive of September 22:

$ cd /var/www/html/
$ sudo wget https://2019.ournetworks.ca/livestream/live-2019-09-22.m3u8

Now you can watch the HLS content at http://10.0.0.1/?m3u8=live-2019-09-22.m3u8.

Storing Content

You can easily store content for offline playback. SSH into the Pi at ssh pi@meshmedia.local and ipfs pin add the CID. For example:

$ ipfs pin add QmNtQiSK7dZbMCH89kgBLzgfMQP3UoWqT2QKWvjtVt2jTx

Now you can disconnect the Pi from the Internet and still be able to watch the content with the URL from before. You will also help to host and seed this content for others once your Pi is connected to the Internet.

You can also share content on your Pi to the IPFS network by using ipfs add and distribute its CID for others to watch:

$ ipfs add --nocopy --pin=true my_content.mp4

Attribution

This software is based on ongoing work by Toronto Mesh, drawing mostly from two repositories:

• prototype-cjdns-pi
• IPFS Live Streaming

The video player uses code from Video.js, graphics from ipfs/artwork, and loading animation from jxnblk/loading.

License

This project is licensed under GNU General Public License version 3 (GPL-3.0).