StorjTorrent

StorjTorrent is a wrapper library for libtorrent's Python bindings. It allows Storj packages to create torrents, seed files to other Storj nodes, and retrieve files using their hashes.

Building

You will need to ensure Boost is properly installed so you can properly build and install libtorrent:

$ wget http://sourceforge.net/projects/boost/files/boost/1.57.0/boost_1_57_0.tar.gz
$ tar -zxvf boost_*.tar.gz
$ cd boost_*
$ ./bootstrap.sh
$ ./b2
$ sudo ./b2 install

After Boost is successfully built, you can build and install libtorrent:

$ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/libtorrent/libtorrent/libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3.tar.gz
$ tar -zxvf libtorrent-*.tar.gz
$ cd libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3
$ ./configure --enable-python-binding
$ make
$ sudo make install

You may also need to run:

$ cd bindings/python
$ sudo python setup.py install

OSX

You may need to have XCode's command line tools installed if you don't already have them set up:

$ xcode-select --install

If you are using OSX, you can use the Homebrew system to install Boost (with Python support) and libtorrent:

$ ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
$ brew install boost-python
$ brew install libtorrent-rasterbar --with-python

Installing Inside a Virtual Environment

Ensure your virtual environment is using Brew's python:

$ mkvirtualenv -p /usr/local/bin/python storjtorrent

If you are installing inside a virtual environment, you can try the following (after you install boost-python with homebrew):

$ brew install boost --with-python
$ brew install boost-build
$ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/libtorrent/libtorrent/libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3.tar.gz
$ tar -zxvf libtorrent-*.tar.gz
$ cd libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3
$ ./configure --disable-debug --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-silent-rules --enable-encryption --prefix=$VIRTUAL_ENV --with-boost=/usr/local/opt/boost --enable-python-binding --with-libiconv --with-boost-python=boost_python-mt PYTHON=python PYTHON_LDFLAGS="$(python-config --libs)"
$ make
$ make install

Ubuntu

Install supporting tools and libraries:

$ apt-get install build-essential libboost-all-dev
$ apt-get source python-libtorrent
$ apt-get build-dep python-libtorrent

Create a new virtual environment. For example, if you have virtualenvwrapper installed, you can use the following to create and enter a new virtual environment called storjtorrent:

$ mkvirtualenv storjtorrent

Then, once inside the virtual environment, run the following commands:

$ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/libtorrent/libtorrent/libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3.tar.gz
$ tar -zxvf libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3.tar.gz
$ cd libtorrent-rasterbar-1.0.3
$ ./configure --disable-debug --disable-dependency-tracking --disable-silent-rules --enable-encryption --prefix=$VIRTUAL_ENV --with-boost-python --enable-dht --with-libiconv --with-boost-libdir=/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/ --enable-python-binding PYTHON=python PYTHON_LDFLAGS="$(python-config --libs)"
$ make
$ make install

You may also need to run:

$ python setup.py install
$ export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/lib/

Compiling Issues

If g++ freezes or errors while building libtorrent, you may not have enough memory on your instance (can be a problem with small Digital Ocean instances). You can try to bypass this issue by creating and enabling a swap file at least 1GB in size:

$ dd if=/dev/zero of=/var/swap.img bs=1024k count=1000
$ mkswap /var/swap.img
$ swapon /var/swap.img

Then, try building again.

Windows

If you are on Windows, after you install Boost and libtorrent, you can use installation packages provided by the libtorrent project to install the Python bindings.

Usage

Generate a New Torrent File

>>> from storjtorrent import StorjTorrent as st

>>> st.generate_torrent([], shard_directory='../storj/data/myshards')

generate_torrent() is a static method you can use to generate a torrent file from a specified folder. At a minimum, you will need to define the folder location. Additional parameters include piece_size, pad_size_limit, flags, comment, creator, private, bootstrap_node, bootstrap_port, torrent_name, save_path and verbose.

Retrieve Hash of Torrent File

>>> from storjtorrent import StorjTorrent as st

>>> st.get_hash([], '../path/to/your/torrentfile')
'e90e06f2a2461801ac6f7a4b4bccd7f1f16393d3'

get_hash() retrieves the SHA1 hash of the specified torrent file as a libtorrent sha1_hash object. You can apply .to_str() to the result to get an encoded string. This string can be used with a magnet link to let others find and download your torrent via DHT. For example, if the command returns ``e90e06f2a2461801ac6f7a4b4bccd7f1f16393d3`, you could use a corresponding magnet link of magnet:?xt=urn:btih:e90e06f2a2461801ac6f7a4b4bccd7f1f16393d3.

Adding a Torrent to the Session

>>> from storjtorrent import StorjTorrent

>>> st = StorjTorrent()
>>> st.add_torrent([], '../path/to/your/torrentfile', True)

Once you create a StorjTorrent() object, a torrent management session is automatically created for you and awaits the addition of a torrent. The first string parameter is the local path, magnet link or URL of the torrent you wish to add. The boolean parameter indicates whether you are seeding a torrent you created (and have all the data for). By setting seeding=True, you enable super-seeding.

Removing a Torrent from the Session

>>> st.remove_torrent([], path='../path/to/your.torrent', delete_files=false)

remove_torrent() indicates that StorjTorrent should no longer be managing this torrent. You can indicate which torrent to stop managing by passing its corresponding SHA1 hash object (which can be determined using get_hash()) or path. You also have the option of deleting all associated torrent data files or not.

Halting a Session

>>> st.halt_session()

halt_session() indicates that StorjTorrent should sleep or stop actively managing torrents. StorjTorrent attempts to automatically manage its sleep state most of the time. For example, if you remove the 'last' torrent that StorjTorrent was managing, it will automatically put itself to sleep. If you then add a new torrent, it will 'wake up' again.

It is important to use halt_session() before you terminate a process using StorjTorrent as the session management is running in a separate thread and won't be terminated automatically if it is still managing torrents.

Retrieving Status of Torrents and Alerts

>>> st.get_status()
{'alerts': ['incoming dht get_peers: ce90f455c3b4928d66006f569b16e2018e405fd2'], 'torrents': {'fake': {'download_rate': 0, 'distributed_copies': -1.0, 'state_str': 'seeding', 'upload_rate': 0, 'progress': 1.0, 'num_peers': 0, 'num_seeds': 0}}}

get_status() returns a dictionary with with an array of alerts and sub-dictionary of torrent statuses. The status dictionary updates every five seconds (though this can be reconfigured). The alerts indicate recent events occuring with StorjTorrent (passed via libtorrent), such as new DHT peers. The torrents dictionary contains information about each torrent that StorjTorrent is managing. It in cludes information such as download rate, upload rate, state (e.g. seeding, downloading, uploading, etc.) and overall progress.