bbbstatus is a utility that allows you to view and save events and their details from bbb-webhooks. bbbstatus was developed as my first Go project. The code quality and design choices reflect this. For a more up-to-date representation of my skills, please take a look at my GitHub.

Configuration

Overview

bbbstatus uses a configuration system to manage runtime settings. It supports a default configuration ( config.toml) and environment variables to override specific values. If the config.toml file is not present, a default configuration file is generated in the current working directory for later modifications.

Configuration sources:

1. default configuration: hardcoded default settings.
2. config.toml: overrides existing defaults if correctly set.
3. environment variables: overrides specific settings by runtime when provided.

Parameter	default value	description	Section
PORT	8080	Port on which bbbstatus will run (default 8080).	BaseConfig
HOST	0.0.0.0	Hostname or IP address of bbbstatus.	BaseConfig
DB_CONNECTION_STRING	postgres://bbbstatus:bbbstatus@localhost/bbbstatus	Database connection string (PostgreSQL).	DatabaseConfig
CSV_STRUCTURE	time,user,action,text representation	Defines the structure of the CSV format for exports.	ReportConfig
SERVE_STATIC_CONTENT	true	Serving static content (true or false).	BaseConfig
BBB_SERVERS	None	A list of Big Blue Button servers used for webhook validation, API functions and Report configuration	BBBServers
TRUSTED_PROXIES	127.0.0.1/8,172.17.0.1/16,::1/128	A comma seperated list of CIDR notated network ranges, used to identify the real ip of the client, configure this value to be the list of proxies in your infrastructure	BaseConfig
SERVER_LANG	en	A setting defining the language the server uses for anonymising users if GDPR is enabled	BaseConfig

Configuration behavior

1. Environment variables

Environment variables will always override default values and config.toml settings by runtime. For example:

• HOST set in the environment overwrites the set hostname or ip defined in config.toml.

2. config.toml

If present, config.toml settings override the default configuration. If missing, a default config.toml is automatically generated, and you can later modify it to your needs. If Environment variables are set, they override both the default configuration and the config.toml configuration

3. Default values

If config.toml is missing or a parameter is not defined, the program falls back to the hardcoded default values.

4. BBBServers

BBB_SERVERS are used for authenticating bbb servers to bbbstatus. This has to be configured differently depending on the configuration methode:

Through config.toml

If you configure bbbstatus using the config.toml, configure BBB_SERVERS like this:

[ [ BBBServers ] ]
   HOSTNAME = "bbb.example.com"
   SHARED_SECRET = "BBB Shared Secret"
   FRIENDLY_NAME = "Example Big Blue Button Server"

To add another BBB server, repeat this block for each server in your list of servers.

Through Environment variables / .env

If you configure bbbstatus using the .env file or using environment variables, configure BBB_SERVERS like this: <Hostname>[:apiPort]

BBB_SERVERS="bbb.example.com:443,bbb2.example.com"

The comma is only required when configuring multiple bbb servers.

Notes

• When configuring BBB servers in this manner, BBBStatus attempts to automatically retrieve the 'SHARED_SECRET' provided with each BBB-Webhook request. One limitation is that this is not persistent, meaning that you have to wait for bbb-webhooks after each restart in order to use API features, such as getting recordings.

  To be absolutely clear: if you restart bbbstatus, you cannot access recordings until the corresponding bbb server has sent a new event.

• You may serve static files separately in your environment; therefore, there is an option to disable this feature. Bbbstatus will use the path /static in any case.

Customization

You can override locales, templates, static content (such as CSS) and even database migrations without recompiling bbbstatus. However, be aware that, although this is possible, it may cause problems as only the embedded and official versions are tested. You can also override multiple files at once. To do this, you need to override every file individually, as described here.

Deployment preparation:

Prepare your bbb server as described in BBBServerPreperation.md

Native Deployment installation guide

Docker Deployment installation guide

Dependencies

Frontend:

• font-awesome 6.0.0
• charts.css 1.1.0

Backend:

• github.com/ilyakaznacheev/cleanenv
• github.com/BurntSushi/toml
• github.com/jackc/pgx/v5
• github.com/labstack/echo/v4
• github.com/labstack/gommon
• github.com/nicksnyder/go-i18n/v2
• github.com/pressly/goose/v3
• golang.org/x/text
• github.com/lithammer/fuzzysearch