npChat is a photo and file sharing application built on Android and is inspired by Snapchat. The project's goals are to develop a completely decentralized application that runs over the Named Data Network (NDN), utilize a partial sync protocol, and utilize a Web-Of-Trust like model instead of the traditional NDN hierarchical model.
npChat requires the NDN Forwarding Daemon be run alongside it. NFD can be installed via Google Play or directly from the source.
To build the application, it is recommended that one uses Android Studio. Simply pull this repository and allow the project to build itself. No other installations are required at this point of time. All dependencies are pulled from external sources when the build file executes. This application only works on Android OS 6.0 and above.
Launch NFD and check "NFD is started."
npChat can communicate via NFD's Wifi Direct feature or over a network that supports UDP multicast.
Once NFD is started, launch npChat and register a username and password for that device. Friends are added under the "Friends" menu by having each device display its QR code and the other device scanning the code in turn.
For our tests, we have been using two MotoX (2nd Gen) phones running LineageOS version 13 with Android 6.0.1.
Please read the NDN Contributing Guide. We are not currently using Gerrit on this project, so that part can be ignored for now. Contributions should follow the NDN Style Guide.