This project was bootstrapped with Create React App.
It uses React to render a Chat application, featuring a global chat room, the possiblity to create separate rooms, and private chat. The app is fully private, stores no messages or user data (apart from the user IDs stored by Socket.io) and encrypts messages so they are invisible to the server. E2E encryption is ensured through the use of Netlify serverless functions.
A full demo of the app can be found here.
SafeChat relies on a Socket.io backend powered by npm. The code for it can be found in a separate repository.
Clone the github repo to your machine.
Execute cd safechat-frontend into the terminal to go into the repo folder
Execute npm install to download all dependencies
Install Netlify CLI globally by running npm i -g netlify-cli or install it for the development of this project only by running npm i --save-dev netlify-cli. This part is essential to have proper E2E encryption.
npm start to open the project on a development server
Make sure to pick an secure encryption key for your app and enter it with the server endpoint as environment variables.
Once in the app, you can send messages to global chat. Entering a room or opening private chat is as simple as clicking on the right name.