Services

In SomaChat, a service would be a standalone application that manages a specific area of concern.

Reasons for having a service-based architecture are separation of concerns, modularity, decentralization.

Mechanism of action

• A service authenticates a user by verifying a signature of some data. The signature is created by the public key corresponding to the user (e.g. the one generated by a password). This is how user data is currently updated (i.e. nickname, tripcode, status, color).

• It might be useful to leverage some functionality via smart contracts.

Types of services

Key service

• Manage keys in a separate container. SKS - Soma Key Service

• Not a shared service; see page

Name service

• Register a unique nickname for your tripcode. SNS - Soma Name Service

Profile service

• Manage non-sensitive user data - profile picture, links, maybe even nickname.

• Manage friend lists.

• Sensitive data is encrypted by the user prior to sending it to the service.

Discovery service

• Discover other networks/servers/users.

Private messaging service

• Send private messages via this instead of the primary server.

• Might need to sync data with the primary server.

Statistics service

• Tracks usage statistics and provides useful analytics