LETS LIVE

ABOUT

This is a project about livestreaming techonologies and solutions related to livestreaming. The project aims to create a functioning livestreaming website from a to z like Twitch.

HOW IT WORKS

• Ingestion: The RTMP is used to get the content of the livestream through OBS
• Transcode: From the RTMP, use FFMpeg to generate the HLS files which also has adaptive bitrate streaming (ABS) for 360p, 720p and 1080p
• When files are generated, segments are stored:
  • Directly serving files, easy but will put a burden on transcode server.
  • Push files into a remote storage, which we are using MinIO.
  • Using a IPFS private network, I have implemented it but only for "using IPFS" demo purpose, otherwise there are no real usecases for using IPFS in livestreaming system, maybe except VOD

TECHNOLOGIES AND TOOLS

• Golang, PostgresQL.
• FFMpeg for transcoding from RTMP to HLS.
• Consul for service discovery and Kong for API Gateway.
• Storage: MinIO (IPFS not supported anymore).
• Docker and Docker Compose for up and running.
• NextJS, ReactJS and TailwindCSS for UI.
• Grafana Loki + Tempo for logging and tracing.

ARCHITECTURE

WITH MINIO

WITH IPFS (no longer support cause usability)

PORTS

• 8000: The main API endpoints/Gateway port.
• 1935: The RTMP default port (for stream ingestion)
• 8889: The web server port (use to get the index.m3u8 and stream.m3u8 files)
• 8888: The port to get .ts files (This port uses nginx as a reverse proxy to get file from the IPFS network).
• 5000: Web Client.
• 4001: IPFS bootstrap node port (allows other nodes outside the network to connect in)
• 8002: Kong API gateway management.
• 12345: Grafana for logging and tracing.

INSTALLATION (LOCAL)

1. Clone the repo
2. Fill in the example.env file with your
3. Change the jwt_secrets.secret as same as your access token secret
4. Uncomment the "web" service in docker compose if I comment it out
5. Run "docker compose up"
6. Access web client at localhost:5000

DEPLOYMENT

Before you deploy (including the GitHub Actions deploy workflow on a self-hosted runner), double-check configs/kong.yml:

1. JWT consumer secret — Under consumers → jwt_secrets, the secret must match the same signing key your auth stack uses for access tokens (ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET). The deploy workflow replaces the placeholder access_token_secret string with the ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET GitHub secret; if you deploy without that step, set the value in the file yourself and keep it in sync with the services.
2. CORS origins — Under plugins → cors → config, set origins to the real browser origins that call the API (for example your production and staging site URLs). With credentials: true, do not rely on ["*"] for production; browsers require explicit allowed origins.

Web client — mock API (optional)

To work on the Next.js UI without Docker or the Go API, use the mock flow: from the web directory run npm install and then npm run dev:mock. That loads .env.mock and serves the app with MSW intercepting backend calls in the browser. More detail is in web/README.md. The mobile app does not use this setup yet.

Last edited: 04/05/2026
Editor: Nam Huynh