`server` 🖥️

This is the central backbone of alpaDrive, running here, and taking care of all the active users & vehicles on a daily basis! We take it pretty seriously, and so should you 😜

What's this?

In order for the core functionalities to work, there should be a central messaging platform where users & vehicles can connect to and communicate with each other, in a secure yet performant way. This server is the means for doing so.

Role in the stack

This server is the backbone of the alpaDrive system. It has the following core functionalities & duties in the stack as a whole:

Act as a central messaging platform for users & vehicles
Provide a central storage mechanism for storing all user & vehicle data including logs in an organized manner
Expose an abstracted endpoint set for easy front end development

Architectural Overview

This is written from the high level system architecture shown below. You can find some pointers below highlighting the core idea in a nutshell. The routes & messaging sections may not even make sense to you if you don't have an understanding of what's going on. Feel free to open a new issue if you find any part of this documentation confusing or hard to understand.

In a nutshell...

Each vehicle can register itself to the server & get a corresponding vid. It can then create & host a room for itself in the server, which will be identified by this vid. The vehicle will be in control of that room.
Users can signup their accounts and pair them to multiple vehicles. They can then join any of the rooms hosted by a paired vehicle. Users can request vehicles to perform certain actions but cannot enforce or command the same.
Any messages being sent over the room can be seen by the server itself. However, messages from one room cannot & should not leak into or be accessible from another as that would be a security issue.

Routes

Routes are mainly for starting a connection with the server. For instance, registering vehicles and users, creating, joining & leaving rooms, etc a.k.a the generic boring stuff.

Signup

Request type: POST
Route: /signup

Format: JSON

{
    "name": "testuser2",
    "username": "testname2",
    "password": "testpass1",
    "uid": "testuid1",
    "email": "testemail2"
}

Returns: The uid of the newly signed up user in MongoDB's ObjectID format
```
{
    "uid": {
        "$oid": "<user-ID>"
    }
}
```

Login

Request type: POST
Route: /login

Format: JSON

{
    "username": "<username>",
    // "email": "<email>"
    "password": "<password>"
}

Returns: An error if either the user doesn't exist or if the credentials are incorrect. Either one of username or email are required to complete the request. Or else the info of that specific user is returned

{
    "uid": {
        "$oid": "63307b31d0c18856548cef9d"
    },
    "name": "\"testuser2\"",
    "username": "\"testname2\"",
    "email": "\"testemail2\"",
    "vehicles": []
}

Status
- Request type: POST
- Route: /status
- Format: JSON
```
{
    "systemstat": false
}
```
- Returns: Active websocket connections indicating number of users and number of vehicles. Also provides system info if systemstat: true. It shouls be noted that an average computer takes ~20ms to measure system resources. So the response time might be delayed with systemstat: true.
```
{
    "active_users": 0,
    "active_vehicles": 0,
    "active_sessions": 0,
    "memory_available": "7.84 GB",
    "memory_used": "2.01 GB",
    "total_swap": "2.10 GB",
    "swap_used": "0.00 GB"
}
```

Register a vehicle

Request type: POST
Route: /vehicle/register

Format: JSON

{
    "company": "BMW",
    "model": "530i M sport"
}

Returns: The MongoDB ObjectId() of the document related to the vehicle. This ID can be used later on for reference in the stack

{
    "success": "Vehicle was registered",
    "id": {
        "$oid": "6337feae9e332e5b3ad192b7"
    }
}

Edit a vehicle

Request type: POST
Route: /vehicle/edit

Format: JSON

{
    "vid": "644e1ecf1b23abbba13a6f90",
    "company": "Volkswagen",
    "model": "Jetta"
}

Returns: a JSON object containing the updated vehicle document

{
    "success": "The vehicle was updated",
    "document": {
        "id": {
        "$oid": "644e1ecf1b23abbba13a6f90"
        },
        "company": "Volkswagen",
        "model": "Jetta"
    }
}

Refresh the list of paired vehicles

Request type: POST
Route: /vehicle/refresh
Format: JSON
```
{
    "uid": "<oid of the user>"
}
```

Returns: A JSON object containing the count of paired vehicles, along with a list of vehicle objects.

{
    "count": 1,
    "vehicles": [
        {
        "_id": {
            "$oid": "63613b6e50ddc3b5ef1cca7c"
        },
        "company": "Skoda",
        "model": "Octavia vRS"
        }
    ]
}

Create and join a vehicle room
- Request type: GET
- Route: /join/vehicle/{uid}
- Format: Plain URL route
```
https://url.com/join/vehicle/{uid}
```
  where uid is the $oid of the vehicle generated during registration
- Returns: A websocket connection upgrade to the room. The vehicle is in control of the room.
- Notes: Only one instance of a vehicle should connect at a time. More than one instance of the same vehicle should never attempt to connect and make a room. If this happens, the server may lose contact with the existing instance and will also never connect to the new instance.
Pair a user & vehicle
- Request type: GET
- Route: /pair/{vid}/{uid}
- Format: Plain URL Route
```
https://url.com/pair/{vid}/{uid}?initial="value" 
```
  where uid & vid are the $oid's of the user & vehicle respectively. value can be either true or false (just pass it as a string). It can be obtained from the QR code itself and will indicate whether the vehicle is being paired for the first time or not.
- Returns: a websocket connection upgrade which automatically disconnects. The disconnect message will contain the result of the database transaction. The vehicle will recieve a message from the server notifying the pair.
- Notes: As mentioned in #6, we have no way of knowing whether a vehicle is currently hosting a room or not. So, regardless of the vehicle's status, the server will pair the user & vehicle. In order to avoid a false pair situation, make sure to place this request only when you get the vid from the QR code generated by the vehicle itself. Don't attempt connecting manually.
Join a vehicle's room
- Request type: GET
- Route: /join/user/{vid}/{uid}
- Format: Plain URL Route
```
https://url.com/join/user/{vid}/{uid}
```
  where uid & vid are the $oid's of the user & vehicle respectively
- Returns: a websocket connection upgrade to the room. The vehicle is in control of the room. The vehicle will obey all commands sent by the users. However, a user can't control other users in the room.
- Notes: If the user isn't paired to the vehicle, the attempt will result in a 404 HTTP response. The connection will only be upgraded if there are no internal errors or conflicts.

Retrieving logs (daily basis)

Request type: POST
Route: /logs/daily

Format: JSON

{
    "vid": "<vid of the vehicle>",
    "date": "<date in DD-MM-YYYY format>"
}

Returns: a JSON object with the vehicle stats & report for that day

{
    "average_speed": 65,
    "stress_count": 0,
    "degradation": 0.0,
    "distance_travelled": 10,
    "last_odometer": 56000,
    "max_speed": {
        "speed": 80,
        "hit_at": "07:57 PM"
    }
}

Retrieving logs (periodic basis)

Request type: POST
Route: /logs/periodic

Format: JSON

{
    "vid": "<vid of the vehicle>",
    "start": "<start date in DD-MM-YYYY format>",
    "end": "<end date in DD-MM-YYYY format>"
}

Returns: a JSON object with the aggregated vehicle stats & report for that period

{
    "average_speed": 65,
    "stress_count": 0,
    "degradation": 0.0,
    "distance_travelled": 100,
    "last_odometer": 56000,
    "max_speed": {
        "speed": 80,
        "hit_at": "07:57 PM"
    }
}

Retrieving logs (overall stats)

Request type: POST
Route: /logs/overall
Format: JSON
```
{
    "vid": "<vid of the vehicle>"
}
```

Returns: a JSON object with the aggregated vehicle stats & report since alpaDrive was initially connected

{
    "average_speed": 65,
    "stress_count": 0,
    "degradation": 0.0,
    "distance_travelled": 100,
    "last_odometer": 56000,
    "max_speed": {
        "speed": 80,
        "hit_at": "07:57 PM"
    }
}

Messaging

The core purpose of this API is to enable organized messaging through websocket connections for connected clients. As such, all messages follow a standard format across the board.

There are two categories of messages that can be sent through the Lobby. Within these categories, messages can be sent to and from the vehicle and connected users. The current format is listed here and is the one being used in v0.1.

Messaging between clients

Clients can send messages in the modes prescribed here. Any message that doesn't ascertain to the standards of the server will be immediately rejected. As it should be obvious, connected clients can be of two types: Vehicles & Users. Hence, there are only two possibilities,

Vehicle -> User: The vehicle should be able to send messages in two ways: Broadcast & Whisper
- Broadcast: This is when the vehicle has to send a common message to all users
- Whisper: This is when the vehicle has to send a message to a specific user only without the others knowing
User -> Vehicle: A user will need to send two types of messages: Action & Request
- Action: This is when the user has to order the vehicle to perform some specific action, say lock the doors.
- Request: This is when the user has to request certain specific data from the vehicle

As mentioned, here is the basic structure of a valid message. Just keep in mind that even is you don't have to use a certain field for your purpose, don't exclude it as it will violate the standard and the message will be rejected altogether, as mentioned.

{
    "mode": "", // mandatory field. cannot be null
    "vid": "", 
    "conn_id": "",
    "status": "",
    "message": "",
    "attachments": []
}

Read on to explore how to use these different modes effectively.

Broadcast

This is when the vehicle has to send a common message to all users. This can happen for the following events:

Internal state of the vehicle has changed & requires all users to update (eg: telemetry)
A special event occurred in the vehicle & users have to be notified

The general format of such a message is as shown

{
    "mode": "broadcast",
    "vid": "<vehicle_id>", // not mandatory
    "conn_id": "", // blank field
    "status": "success", // one of ["success", "warn", "error"] - defaults to success
    "message": "<message as string>",
    "attachments": [] // optional, as string
}

Note The vehicle can broadcast any valid string as a message. But, in order for it to be logged, it should follow another standard format.
{
  "gear": "<integer value>", // optional
  "speed": "<integer value>", // optional
  "rpm": "<integer value>", // optional
  "location": {
      "latitude": 0.0, // optional float value
      "longitude": 0.0 // optional float value 
  }, // optional
  "temp": "<integer value>", // optional
  "fuel": "<integer value>", // optional
  "odo": "<integer value>",
  "stressed": true // or false    
}
If a message is sent without this adhering to this format, then the data won't be logged in the database and will be lost. It won't be use for computation afterwards. The message will however, be broadcasted to the users in the room.

Whisper

This is when the vehicle has to send a message to a specific user only without the others knowing. This can happen for the following events:

A user requested ordered a certain action and only that user needs to know the status
A user requested some specific data, and it needs to be sent only to that user

The general format of such a message is as shown

{
    "mode": "whisper",
    "vid": "<vehicle_id>", // not mandatory
    "conn_id": "<user_id>", // for verification at the client side
    "status": "success", // one of ["success", "warn", "error"] - defaults to success
    "message": "<message as string>",
    "attachments": [] // optional, as string
}

Action

This is when the user has to order the vehicle to perform some specific action, say lock the doors. In this case, the action will be a member of a finite predefined set of actions. This should be obvious because a vehicle can only execute so many actions.

The general format of such a message is as shown

{
    "mode": "action",
    "vid": "<vehicle_id>", // optional
    "conn_id": "<user_id>", // for identification be server and/or vehicle
    "status": "success", // one of ["success", "warn", "error"] - defaults to success
    "message": "<action as string>", // one of the predefined actions
    "attachments": [] // optional, as string
}

Request

This is when the user has to request certain specific data from the vehicle. This can happen when the user taps on some option and the data have to be fetched then. Again, a user can only request so many things to a vehicle, so the request will be a member of a predefined finite set of requests.

The general format of such a message is as shown

{
    "mode": "request",
    "vid": "<vehicle_id>", // optional
    "conn_id": "<user_id>", // for identification be server and/or vehicle
    "status": "success", // one of ["success", "warn", "error"] - defaults to success
    "message": "<request as string>", // one of predefined requests
    "attachments": [] // optional, as string
}

Messages from server

So far, we discussed about how clients can send messages amongst themselves. This part of the guide walks you through the kind of messages that can originate from the server itself. In v0.1, this only occurs due to internal server errors, like when a message isn't compatible with the server's standards. This may change in the future versions.

A sample message contains the following parameters:

event: denotes the event which caused the message to be sent
client: will hold the data of a client involved with the message, if any
message: an optional message, if any
error: an error message, if any

and will look somewhat like this

{
     "event": "connect" // connect, disconnect, error
     "client": {
         "uid": "<>", // $oid of the client, if involved,
         "conn_id": "<connection uuid>" // uuid representing the agent internally in the server
      },
      "message": "an optional message, if any",
      "error": "an error message, if any"
}

Setup Guide

You can follow this guide to run the server on a machine of your choice. If you want to run the server, install all the prerequisites except the first one & skip to the installation instructions. Make sure you're running on a Linux OS, preferably Ubuntu If you wanna develop or build from source, continue below.

Prerequisites

The Rust toolchain, including cargo: Install from here by downloading the rustup-init executable for your platform. Alternatively, download & run the standalone installer for your platform from the links provided here.
Git CLI: Install by running the executable for your platform available here.
MongoDB Community Server: After running the installer found here, make sure that the server is up and running on port 27017.

Note 27017 is of course the default port that it'd be running on. If you somehow end up running it on a different port, make sure to update it in the code.

Build From Source

After making sure that all prerequisites are satisfied, follow the steps one by one to build and run the code.

Either clone this repo

git clone https://github.com/alpaDrive/server.git
cd server

or make a new directory and pull the code

mkdir server && cd server
git init
git remote add origin https://github.com/alpaDrive/server.git
git pull origin main

Start the API server
```
cargo run
```

The server will now be served on port 7878, which you can view by visiting localhost:7878 in your browser. A simple HTML page with a logo can be seen. That's it, happy hacking! 🍻

Installation Instructions

These instructions define how you can run a production server on port 7878. Make sure you have a Linux x86 OS installed.

Clone this repository and change working directory

git clone https://github.com/alpaDrive/server.git
cd server/

Switch to the build branch
```
git fetch origin
git checkout build
```
Run the binary directly
```
./release/server
```

You can keep the server running using the screen utility. Here is a beginner friendly guide for getting started. You can then link your domain name (if you have one) and route the connection using Nginx for deploying this to the cloud. If you find anything missing or wrong in this documentation, make sure to open an issue, we're happy to help or correct ourselves! 🖤

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 20 Commits
.github/workflows		.github/workflows
html		html
logger		logger
sockets		sockets
src		src
types		types
.gitignore		.gitignore
Cargo.lock		Cargo.lock
Cargo.toml		Cargo.toml
README.md		README.md

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Repository files navigation

`server` 🖥️

Table Of Contents

What's this?

Role in the stack

Architectural Overview

Routes

Signup

Login

Status

Register a vehicle

Edit a vehicle

Refresh the list of paired vehicles

Create and join a vehicle room

Pair a user & vehicle

Join a vehicle's room

Retrieving logs (daily basis)

Retrieving logs (periodic basis)

Retrieving logs (overall stats)

Messaging

Messaging between clients

Broadcast

Whisper

Action

Request

Messages from server

Setup Guide

Prerequisites

Build From Source

Installation Instructions

About

Releases

Languages

alpaDrive/server

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Repository files navigation

server 🖥️

Table Of Contents

What's this?

Role in the stack

Architectural Overview

Routes

Signup

Login

Status

Register a vehicle

Edit a vehicle

Refresh the list of paired vehicles

Create and join a vehicle room

Pair a user & vehicle

Join a vehicle's room

Retrieving logs (daily basis)

Retrieving logs (periodic basis)

Retrieving logs (overall stats)

Messaging

Messaging between clients

Broadcast

Whisper

Action

Request

Messages from server

Setup Guide

Prerequisites

Build From Source

Installation Instructions

About

Resources

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`server` 🖥️