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| title | description |
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| Build | Learn how to build your own app via LBRY in this comprehensive guide! The future of content freedom begins with you. *patriotic music plays* |
THIS IS NOT DONE AT ALL AND IF YOU CONTINUE TO READ IT YOU MENTALLY ASSENT TO COMMITTING AT LEAST ONE CHANGE THAT MAKES IT BETTER
Introduction
Want to build something on top of LBRY? This is the place to get started.
At least, it's the place to get started so long as you have some idea of what LBRY is. If you don't, you should read the Overview and the spec for more technical details.
Want to build with us rather than on your own? Check out our Contributing Guide.
When to Use LBRY
- You want to build an application that contributes to the world's knowledge, or benefits from global, shared discovery.
- You want to replace an existing centralized service related to digital content distribution with a decentralized or community-controlled one.
- You want to build an application that is permissionless to interact with.
- You want to further openness, freedom of information, and/or personal choice on the internet.
When Not to Use LBRY
- You want to privately distribute data or information. LBRY is designed for publishing and sharing information in an open fashion.
- You want to do illegal things.
Application Basics
You can build many types of apps. Fat apps, short apps, tall apps, skinny apps!
Most end-user applications will use the lbry-sdk as a way of accessing and communicating with the LBRY network. A look at the APIs provided by the SDK will help you understand what facilities the SDK provides.
Some applications do not need to access content available on the network (e.g. a wallet-only app, or a blockchain visualizer). These applications might use lbrycrd, the blockchain daemon, or chainquery, which parses blockchain data into SQL.
Let's look at some specific types of applications and the basic design for each.
Web Applications
Full Web Applications
By full web application, we mean a centrally-hosted web application that uses most or all of the suite of capabilities the LBRY protocol provides.
- Pick your favorite language and stack and do your typical setup to get a "Hello World" application running.
- Install lbry-sdk. (Docker images? Other convenient ways of doing this?)
- Bridging basics.
- See SDK Basics
Blockchain Applications
Sometimes you don't need the SDK. If you wanted to build a block explorer, you would only need to include lbrycrd. Or if you only want to search through blockchain, chainquery is perfect for that. You can pair these with any language or tooling you want.
Other Web Applications
It is also possible to create a browser extension similar to Joule and Metamask. The browser could interact with the SDK running locally on a users computer, or through a centrally hosted server.
Desktop Applications
If you are looking for more decentralization, a full desktop app can achieve that. If that is not something you care about, there are still a number of features that are desirable over a traditional web application, with full access to the file system being one of those. This allows users to be in control of how they view their files, and if they want to help strengthen LBRY network through seeding.
If you would like to create a desktop application, there are a few ways to do so.
Electron Apps
The official LBRY desktop app is built with electron. It is very easy to develop with, and allows web developers to easily start creating "native" desktop applications. You can use a plain html page with a <script> tag, or build out a large web app. The official desktop app uses React.
If you do want to write an electron app, check out the Electron Starter Project for a bare bones setup that is very similar to how lbry-desktop is structured. It's also a simple way to explore the SDK api. We are actively trying to make it better. If you see something wrong, feel free to submit an issue or PR! :)
Other Applications
Who needs javascript? You can use any language to develop your own LBRY desktop application. Just use the SDK (see SDK Basics).
Mobile Applications
Android Applications
- (Whatever magic you have to do to get a daemon running on Android.)
iOS Applications
We do not currently have tooling available to build LBRY apps on iOS.
Application Tooling
SDK
Talk about using SDK, docs, etc.
When To Use
Tips / Best Practices
- Always leave a tip.
Pitfalls
- Lex
Chainquery
When To Use
- You want blockchain data.
Tips / Best Practices
- Use it.
Pitfalls
- mempool
lbrycrd
When To Use
Tips and Best Practices
- use chainquery and lbrycrd together
- use types to get structured data
Pitfalls
- API naming
Community and Support
Interact with other devs! Share your app!