Origin: Create script for pinning ipfs data using ipfs-cluster API

[tomlinton]

We need a script that can process a listing json and extract any IPFS hashes, and then use a REST API provided by ipfs-cluster to pin the hashes. The documentation for a ipfs-cluster API client written in Go is available here but we will need a JavaScript implementation that supports the pin and unpin methods. Some API documentation for ipfs-cluster is available here.

The script will run as a Google Cloud Function and be passed JSON data with IPFS hashes from the event-listener via Google Cloud Pub/Sub. We have an example of a similar function here which does Discord announcements from Google Cloud Build events. This might help someone who wants to take this on.

Related discussion #912.

[franckc]

@mouazq Would you be interested in working on this issue ? It would be pretty impactful since it will allow us to pin (e.g. "replicate") content that gets uploaded to our IPFS cluster into a separate 3rd party cluster that the Protocol Labs team made available for us.... Let us know :)

[rohitverma007]

Hello, new here, would love to contribute and work on this issue :)

[rohitverma007]

@tomlinton just a few questions.
You mentioned "any" IPFS hashes. So, it is possible to have empty media arrays? If the url does exist, will it always be a ipfs location or can it be of other format? I saw references to allowing data and dweb urls as well.

For the script it self, will the HTTP endpoint of the cluster (e.g 127.0.0.1:9094) be an input to the script (e.g as an environment variable)? If not, is there a default endpoint to be assumed? Just realized ProtocolLabs provides a url, will access it through an env variable.

[DanielVF]

We currently allow data urls in user profiles, but in listings, the media urls should only be IPFS.

[tomlinton]

Also on the URL front, it uses HTTP basic auth so there should be env vars for username/password. Thanks for your work on this, looking great so far!

[modullar]

@rohitverma007

Did you work on any part yet ? we can pair program it if you want ?

[rohitverma007]

@mouazq
Yes, I did get started on it, although have been delayed a bit due to holidays. I hope to finish it off or get majority of it done in the next few days.

So far, I added a new file under utils folder in the deployment folder, this service connects to the ipfs cluster api and added the "pinning" functionality so far, https://github.com/OriginProtocol/origin/commit/5adab2c51ccd2b9e3abe046662916d0576b6d196
Currently getting familiar with google cloud functions and pub/sub and getting started on that.

[rohitverma007]

Hi all,

Just an update, almost done the feature.

Here's the latest code: https://github.com/OriginProtocol/origin/compare/rohit/ipfs-cluster-api

I made an assumption about the data sent by the publisher. I assumed the publisher will simply pass on the raw listing json to the function, and only one listing per publish. Following shows the data that will be sent to the topic: https://github.com/OriginProtocol/origin/blob/af1d3339bab59aaaf028e791ace5e424c4034bb6/deployment/utils/gcf-pin-ipfs-hash/publisher.js#L11-L12

Let me know if that's incorrect so I can modify it accordingly.
Also, let me know if there's anything else missing or anything else that doesn't look right.

[franckc]

Hi @rohitverma007 - Thanks for your work on this ! :)

• Yes, your assumption is correct that the publisher will pass a single listing per call
• In terms of the format of the data, we probably need a few adjustments:
  
  
  
  • In addition to pinning the IPFS hashes that are referenced from within the listing data (ex: media), we also want to pin the hash of the listing itself. So that listing hash needs to be passed along.
  
  
  • We should make sure the script can easily be extended in the future so that it can process a variety of data, not just listing. For example offer data, user profile data, etc... You can see here the various pieces of data we save in IPFs and that we'll want to pin in the future.
    
    
    
    
    
    • The data will get emitted by the "event-listener" component. Take a look at this code to get more details.
    
    
    
  
  

Also, feel free to start a PR so that it is easier to comment on the code ? Thanks again...

[rohitverma007]

Thanks for the feedback @franckc .

Updated the incoming data format https://github.com/OriginProtocol/origin/blob/5fb19090e684c6f503b8ebd2e55c13377163d537/deployment/utils/gcf-pin-ipfs-hash/index.js#L9-L18 as an attempt to generalize it more, hopefully it covers all cases. The listing/offer hash can be placed in the ipfsHash and the listing/offer json can be placed in the rawData.
Created the pr #1215, feel free to comment there.

[tomlinton]

Done #1215, thanks @rohitverma007!