Welcome to BoostServerTech Chat documentation!

Be sure to check out our live demo!

The BoostServerTech project

This repository contains a chat application written in C++. It’s part of the BoostServerTech series, a collection of projects to showcase how the Boost libraries can be used together to build high-performance web servers.

If you’re a developer looking for inspiration, this project can be useful to you in a number of ways:

  • It demonstrates how to use Boost libraries for server-side, asynchronous networking.

  • It follows Boost and C++ best practices.

  • It can save you setup time by providing a project skeleton you can use for your own app. This includes server boilerplate code, a working client, tests and CI/CD scripts. You can fork the project, modify it to match your needs, and go live in minutes.

If you’re a Boost contributor, want to become one, or just want to exercise your C++ abilities, this project is a good place to start. Please read the contributing section for details.

A group chat app

The best way to know the app is to try it!.

Here are some of the current and planned features:

  • Users send and receive messages in group chats called "chat rooms". Point-to-point messaging is not currently planned.

  • Users can create accounts and log in using an email and a password.

  • Chat rooms are currently statically defined in the server, but will be dynamic in the future.

Technical overview

The following diagram presents an overview of the application architecture:

servertech arch

  • There is a single, C++ based webserver.

  • Messages are stored in a Redis database, configured with persistence enabled.

  • Objects that don’t require low-latency access (such as users) are stored in MySQL.

  • The front-end is web-based, written in React.

  • Front-end and back-end communicate using a REST API and websockets.

  • The front-end is served by the C++ server as regular, static files.

  • The C++ server and the two database servers are deployed as Docker containers. Deployments are performed automatically by a GitHub Actions pipeline.

  • The project includes a test suite, including server and client unit tests, as well as Python-based integration tests.

You can learn more about the project architecture by reading this section.

Running the application locally

If you’ve got Docker Compose installed in your machine, you can build and run the entire application by just typing in a terminal:

$> docker compose up --build

If you want to set up a more traditional development environment on your local machine, check this section out.

Instant Deployment: From GitHub Fork to Public Server in Minutes

Would you like to have your own working copy of our application? We’ve enabled a super-simple CI/CD workflow that lets you fork the repository, modify what you want and deploy it to AWS in minutes. Check out this section to learn more.

Contributing

We always welcome contributions! As a fist step, please join our Slack discussion group and have a look at the open issues.

You can contribute by submitting PRs, writing docs or tests, or opening issues if you’ve found a bug.

If you want to share any piece of feedback with us, either positive or negative, you can do so by commenting on this issue.

If you’re a Boost author and you would like to showcase your library, you can fork this project and modify it to build your own BoostServerTech application.