Ssb-neon-keys NPM

ssb-neon-keys

A drop-in replacement of ssb-keys, implemented in Rust and delivered as a native module in Node.js

npm install ssb-neon-keys

Motivation

It would make a lot of sense for SSB to be implemented in Rust, a language for safety and performance. Sunrise Choir has written a lot of SSB modules in Rust, but these are not yet running in production, simply because it requires a lot of work to migrate from Node.js (and/or Electron) to Rust.

Neon allows you to create native modules for Node.js written in Rust. This is great, because it allows us to use Sunrise Choir's modules directly inside Node.js!

ssb-neon-keys does exactly that, it runs ssb-crypto, ssb-keyfile, ssb-multiformats (Rust crates) under the hood, but provides an API that perfectly mirrors that of ssb-keys. There is no code you need to migrate, just replace ssb-keys with ssb-neon-keys and it's done.

We even run the same test suite for ssb-keys on ssb-neon-keys.

Usage

There are two ways you can use this npm package.

Option 1: (easiest) automatically replace

In your package.json, assuming you already have ssb-keys, you can replace its implementation by pointing to the GitHub repo for ssb-neon-keys:

   // ...
   "dependencies": {
     "ssb-ebt": "^5.6.7",
     "ssb-friends": "^4.1.4",
     "ssb-invite": "^2.1.3",
-    "ssb-keys": "7.2.0",
+    "ssb-keys": "staltz/ssb-neon-keys#replace-7.2.0",
     "ssb-lan": "^0.2.0",
     "ssb-logging": "^1.0.0",
     "ssb-markdown": "^6.0.4",
   }
   // ...

This is the easiest method because you only need to change package.json, your code can still require('ssb-keys') and under the hood it will load ssb-neon-keys.

Note that you cannot specify version ranges. If you previously had "ssb-keys": "7.x.x", you will have to specify an exact version when you write "staltz/ssb-neon-keys#replace-7.2.0", you cannot write "staltz/ssb-neon-keys#replace-7.x.x".

Option 2: manually replace

This method gives you more control over the usage of ssb-neon-keys, as well as allows you to specify version ranges. Just remove ssb-keys from your package.json, and add ssb-neon-keys:

   // ...
   "dependencies": {
     "ssb-ebt": "^5.6.7",
     "ssb-friends": "^4.1.4",
     "ssb-invite": "^2.1.3",
-    "ssb-keys": "7.2.0",
+    "ssb-neon-keys": ">=7.2.0-1",
     "ssb-lan": "^0.2.0",
     "ssb-logging": "^1.0.0",
     "ssb-markdown": "^6.0.4",
   }
   // ...

Then, you also have to replace usages of ssb-keys manually in JavaScript source files:

-var ssbKeys = require('ssb-keys')
+var ssbKeys = require('ssb-neon-keys')

 // ...

Versioning and support

ssb-neon-keys@X.Y.Z-num is compatible with ssb-keys@X.Y.Z.

Versions of ssb-keys that are mirrored by ssb-neon-keys currently include (and which platforms are guaranteed to be supported):

As of ssb-neon-keys@8.0.0-2

macOS (darwin-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Linux (linux-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Windows (win32-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x

As of ssb-neon-keys@7.2.2-2

macOS (darwin-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Linux (linux-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Windows (win32-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x

As of ssb-neon-keys@7.2.1-3

macOS (darwin-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Linux (linux-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Windows (win32-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x

As of ssb-neon-keys@7.2.0-18

macOS (darwin-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Linux (linux-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x
Windows (win32-x64)
- Node 10.x
- Node 12.x
- Node 14.x
- Electron 7.x
- Electron 8.x
- Electron 9.x
- Electron 10.x