Skiff

Raft Consensus Algorithm implementation for Node.js.

• Persists to LevelDB (or any database exposing a LevelDown interface).
• Exposes the cluster as a Levelup or Leveldown-compatible interface, with which you can extend using the Levelup plugins.
• Encodes messages using Msgpack

Installation

$ npm install skiff --save

Usage

const Skiff = require('skiff')

const options = {
  db: require('memdown'), // in memory database
  peers: [ // peer addresses
    '/ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/9491',
    '/ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/9492'
  ]
}
const skiff = Skiff('/ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/9490', options)

// expose the cluster as a Levelup-compatible database
const db = skiff.levelup()

skiff.start(err => {
  if (err) {
    console.error('Error starting skiff node: ', err.message)
  } else {
    console.log('Skiff node started')

    db.put('key', 'value', (err) => {
      // ...
    })
  }
})

API

Skiff (address, options)

Returns a new skiff node.

Arguments:

• address (string, mandatory): an address in the multiaddr format (example: "/ip/127.0.0.1/tcp/5398").

• options (object):

  • network (object): if you want to share the network with other skiff nodes on the same process, create a network using Skiff.createNetwork(options) (see below)
  • server (object):
    • port (integer): TCP port. Defaults to the port in address
    • host (string): host name to bind the server to. Defaults to the host name in the address
  • rpcTimeoutMS (integer, defaults to 2000): Timeout for RPC calls.
  • peers (array of strings, defaults to []): The addresses of the peers (also in the multiaddr format). If the database you're using is persisted to disk (which is the default), these peers will be overrridden by whatever is loaded from the latest snapshot once the node starts.
  • levelup (object): options to the internal Levelup database. Defaults to:

  {
    keyEncoding: 'utf8',
    valueEncoding: 'json'
  }

  • location (string): Location of the base directory for the leveldb files. Defaults to the data directory on the root of this package (not recommended)
  • db (function, defaults to Leveldown implementation): Database constructor, should return a Leveldown implementation.

(You can use this to create a in-memory database using Memdown)

• Advanced options

  • appendEntriesIntervalMS (integer, defaults to 100): The interval (ms) with which a leader sends AppendEntries messages to the followers (ping).
  • electionTimeoutMinMS (integer, defaults to 300): The minimum election timeout (ms) for a node. It's the minimum time a node has to wait until no AppendEntries message triggers an election.
  • electionTimeoutMaxMS (integer, defaults to 600): The maximum election timeout (ms) for a node. It's the maximum time a node has to wait until no AppendEntries message triggers an election.
  • installSnapshotChunkSize (integer, defaults to 10): The maximum number of database records on each InstallSnapshot message.
  • batchEntriesLimit (integer, defaults to 10): The maximum number of log entries in a AppendEntries message.
  • clientRetryRPCTimeout (integer, defaults to 200): The number of miliseconds the internal client has to wait until retrying
  • clientMaxRetries (integer, defaults to 10): The maximum number of times the client is allowed to retry the remote call.

skiff.start (callback)

Starts the node, initializing. Calls back with no argument when started, or with error in the first argument.

skiff.stop (callback)

Stops the node, shutting down server, disconnects from all peers and stops activity. Calls back once all this is done, or when an error is encountered, with an error in the first argument.

skiff.levelup ()

Returns a new Levelup-compatible object for you to interact with the cluster.

skiff.leveldown ()

Returns a new Leveldown-compatible object for you to interact with the cluster.

skiff.join (peerAddress, callback)

Adds a peer to the cluster. Calls back once the cluster reaches consensus, or with an error if no consensus can be reached.

skiff.leave (peerAddress, callback)

Removes a peer from the cluster. Calls back once the cluster reaches consensus, or with an error if no consensus can be reached.

skiff.stats ()

Returns some interesting stats for this node.

skiff.peers (callback)

Invokes the error-first callback function with the cluster peers and some interesting stats from each.

skiff.term ()

Returns the current term (integer).

skiff.weaken (durationMS)

Weakens the node for the duration. During this period, the node transitions to a special weakened state, in which the node does not react to election timeouts. This period ends once it learns a new leader or the period runs out.

skiff.readConsensus(callback)

Asks for read consensus from the cluster. Calls back when there is an error (with the error as the first argument) or succeeded.

Events

A skiff instance emits the following events:

• started: once the node is started (network server is up and persisted state is loaded)
• warning (err): if a non-fatal error was encountered
• connect (peer): once a leader node is connected to a peer
• disconnect (peer): once a leader node is disconnected from a peer
• new state (state): once a node changes state (possible states are follower, candidate and leader)
• leader: once the node becomes the cluster leader
• joined (peerAddress): when a peer joined the cluster
• left (peerAddress): whan a peer left the cluster
• rpc latency (ms): the latency for an RPC call, in milisenconds

Skiff.createNetwork (options)

Creates a network you can share amongst several Skiff nodes in the same process.

Options:

• active (object):
  • innactivityTimeout (integer, miliseconds, defaults to 5000): The amount of time to wait before a client connection is closed because of innactivity.
• passive (object):
  • server (object):
    • port (integer, defaults to 9163): the port the server should listen on
    • host (string, defaults to "0.0.0.0"): the interface address the server should listen to
    • exclusive (boolean, defaults to true): if true, the server is not shareable with other processes (see Server#listen() on Node.js docs).

Sponsors

Development of Skiff is sponsored by YLD.

License

MIT

Copyright

Copyright (c) 2016 Pedro Teixeira