uwla/lnpaywall

LN-enabled paywall for generic web service.

LNPAYWALL

LN-enabled Paywall for ANY generic webservice.

WATCH THE DEMO VIDEO

LNPAYDEMO.mp4

How it works

The user has to pay some amount of money to use the service for a chosen period of time:

1. User chooses for how long he wishes to access the service.
2. User pays invoice.
3. Payment is confirmed.
4. User can access the requested web service.
5. After time expires, user goes back to step 1.

Advantages

It can be integrated with ANY web service WITHOUT CHANGES to the service.

It just requires setting up the reverse-proxy to point to the machine hosting the web service.

The server providing the webservice is not aware of the proxy.

This separation of concerns frees the developer from the burden of setting up plugins, libraries and new APIs.

Local setup

automated setup

The script ./setup-Uizard.sh automates the process of configuring envvars for docker, the lnserver and the backend. Just run:

./setup-wizard.sh

It will prompt for values of environment variables, then will create the .env files and bring up docker containers.

This script DOES NOT set up Polar and the frontend container. For that, you have to do it yourself.

polar

Set up a local LN network using Polar with at least two LND nodes with a balaced channel.

frontend

Create a network:

docker network create <network_name>

Create a docker container to mock a web service (streaming, online gaming, video conferecing, and so on).

docker container run \
    --name <container_name> \
    --network <network_name> \
    --rm \
    --detach \
    <container_img> <container_cmd>

You can also attach an existing container to the network:

docker network connect <network_name> <container_name>

Here is a real example of how to setup the frontend container:

docker network create frontendnet
mkdir website && echo "hello world!" > website/hello.txt
docker container run \
    --name frontend \
    --network frontendnet \
    --volume ./website:/app:ro \
    --rm \
    --detach \
    evop/static_webserver

lnserver

Skip this step if you used setup_wizard.sh.

Create env file at lnserver/.env:

cd lnserver/ && cp .env.sample .env

You need to replace it with the proper values. The default values are the ones used when you first create a Polar network.

backend

Skip this step if you used setup_wizard.sh.

Create the .env file:

cd backend/ && cp .env.example .env

You need to adjust the FRONTEND_URI to match the <container_name> of your frontend container. You also need to generate an application key, which you can do so with the command:

echo "base64:$(openssl rand -base64 32)"

Or, if the backend container is running already:

docker container exec --user 1000 lnpaywall-backend php artisan key:generate

docker

Skip this step if you used setup_wizard.sh.

Copy .env.sample to .env:

cp .env.sample .env

Adjust the values if needed:

LN_NETWORK=polar-network-1_default
FRONTEND_NETWORK=frontendnet

Where:

• LN_NETWORK: the name of the Docker network used by Polar.
• FRONTEND_NETWORK: a docker network attached to the frontend container

After that, bring the containers up:

docker-compose up --detach

Tech stack

• typescript + nodejs (REST server for lightning queries)
• laravel (backend for handling user session and http proxy)
• docker (container technology)
• polar (simulate local LN network)

Notes

Currently, this is a proof-of-concept only.

LICENSE

MIT.