swarm/README: add more sections to easily onboard developers (#17333)

1 files changed, 190 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/swarm/README.md b/swarm/README.md
index f2d189043..e81963217 100644
--- a/swarm/README.md
+++ b/swarm/README.md
@@ -7,6 +7,21 @@ Swarm is a distributed storage platform and content distribution service, a nati
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+## Table of Contents
+
+*  [Building the source](#building-the-source)
+*  [Running Swarm](#running-swarm)
+*  [Documentation](#documentation)
+*  [Developers Guide](#developers-guide)
+   *  [Go Environment](#development-environment)
+   *  [Vendored Dependencies](#vendored-dependencies)
+   *  [Testing](#testing)
+   *  [Profiling Swarm](#profiling-swarm)
+   *  [Metrics and Instrumentation in Swarm](#metrics-and-instrumentation-in-swarm)
+*  [Public Gateways](#public-gateways)
+*  [Swarm Dapps](#swarm-dapps)
+*  [Contributing](#contributing)
+*  [License](#license)
 
 ## Building the source
 
@@ -16,13 +31,187 @@ Building Swarm requires Go (version 1.10 or later).
 
     go install github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum/cmd/swarm
 
+## Running Swarm
+
+Going through all the possible command line flags is out of scope here, but we've enumerated a few common parameter combos to get you up to speed quickly on how you can run your own Swarm node.
+
+To run Swarm you need an Ethereum account. You can create a new account by running the following command:
+
+    geth account new
+
+You will be prompted for a password:
+
+    Your new account is locked with a password. Please give a password. Do not forget this password.
+    Passphrase:
+    Repeat passphrase:
+
+Once you have specified the password, the output will be the Ethereum address representing that account. For example:
+
+    Address: {2f1cd699b0bf461dcfbf0098ad8f5587b038f0f1}
+
+Using this account, connect to Swarm with
+
+    swarm --bzzaccount <your-account-here>
+
+    # in our example
+
+    swarm --bzzaccount 2f1cd699b0bf461dcfbf0098ad8f5587b038f0f1
+
+
+### Verifying that your local Swarm node is running
+
+When running, Swarm is accessible through an HTTP API on port 8500.
+
+Confirm that it is up and running by pointing your browser to http://localhost:8500
+
+### Ethereum Name Service resolution
+
+The Ethereum Name Service is the Ethereum equivalent of DNS in the classic web. In order to use ENS to resolve names to Swarm content hashes (e.g. `bzz://theswarm.eth`), `swarm` has to connect to a `geth` instance, which is synced with the Ethereum mainnet. This is done using the `--ens-api` flag.
+
+    swarm --bzzaccount <your-account-here> \
+          --ens-api '$HOME/.ethereum/geth.ipc'
+
+    # in our example
+
+    swarm --bzzaccount 2f1cd699b0bf461dcfbf0098ad8f5587b038f0f1 \
+          --ens-api '$HOME/.ethereum/geth.ipc'
+
+For more information on usage, features or command line flags, please consult the Documentation.
+
 
 ## Documentation
 
 Swarm documentation can be found at [https://swarm-guide.readthedocs.io](https://swarm-guide.readthedocs.io).
 
 
-## Contribution
+## Developers Guide
+
+### Go Environment
+
+We assume that you have Go v1.10 installed, and `GOPATH` is set.
+
+You must have your working copy under `$GOPATH/src/github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum`.
+
+Most likely you will be working from your fork of `go-ethereum`, let's say from `github.com/nirname/go-ethereum`. Clone or move your fork into the right place:
+
+```
+git clone git@github.com:nirname/go-ethereum.git $GOPATH/src/github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum
+```
+
+
+### Vendored Dependencies
+
+All dependencies are tracked in the `vendor` directory. We use `govendor` to manage them.
+
+If you want to add a new dependency, run `govendor fetch <import-path>`, then commit the result.
+
+If you want to update all dependencies to their latest upstream version, run `govendor fetch +v`.
+
+
+### Testing
+
+This section explains how to run unit, integration, and end-to-end tests in your development sandbox.
+
+Testing one library:
+
+```
+go test -v -cpu 4 ./swarm/api
+```
+
+Note: Using options -cpu (number of cores allowed) and -v (logging even if no error) is recommended.
+
+Testing only some methods:
+
+```
+go test -v -cpu 4 ./eth -run TestMethod
+```
+
+Note: here all tests with prefix TestMethod will be run, so if you got TestMethod, TestMethod1, then both!
+
+Running benchmarks:
+
+```
+go test -v -cpu 4 -bench . -run BenchmarkJoin
+```
+
+
+### Profiling Swarm
+
+This section explains how to add Go `pprof` profiler to Swarm
+
+If `swarm` is started with the `--pprof` option, a debugging HTTP server is made available on port 6060.
+
+You can bring up http://localhost:6060/debug/pprof to see the heap, running routines etc.
+
+By clicking full goroutine stack dump (clicking http://localhost:6060/debug/pprof/goroutine?debug=2) you can generate trace that is useful for debugging.
+
+
+### Metrics and Instrumentation in Swarm
+
+This section explains how to visualize and use existing Swarm metrics and how to instrument Swarm with a new metric.
+
+Swarm metrics system is based on the `go-metrics` library.
+
+The most common types of measurements we use in Swarm are `counters` and `resetting timers`. Consult the `go-metrics` documentation for full reference of available types.
+
+```
+# incrementing a counter
+metrics.GetOrRegisterCounter("network.stream.received_chunks", nil).Inc(1)
+
+# measuring latency with a resetting timer
+start := time.Now()
+t := metrics.GetOrRegisterResettingTimer("http.request.GET.time"), nil)
+...
+t := UpdateSince(start)
+```
+
+#### Visualizing metrics
+
+Swarm supports an InfluxDB exporter. Consult the help section to learn about the command line arguments used to configure it:
+
+```
+swarm --help | grep metrics
+```
+
+We use Grafana and InfluxDB to visualise metrics reported by Swarm. We keep our Grafana dashboards under version control at `./swarm/grafana_dashboards`. You could use them or design your own.
+
+We have built a tool to help with automatic start of Grafana and InfluxDB and provisioning of dashboards at https://github.com/nonsense/stateth , which requires that you have Docker installed.
+
+Once you have `stateth` installed, and you have Docker running locally, you have to:
+
+1. Run `stateth` and keep it running in the background
+```
+stateth --rm --grafana-dashboards-folder $GOPATH/src/github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum/swarm/grafana_dashboards --influxdb-database metrics
+```
+
+2. Run `swarm` with at least the following params:
+```
+--metrics \
+--metrics.influxdb.export \
+--metrics.influxdb.endpoint "http://localhost:8086" \
+--metrics.influxdb.username "admin" \
+--metrics.influxdb.password "admin" \
+--metrics.influxdb.database "metrics"
+```
+
+3. Open Grafana at http://localhost:3000 and view the dashboards to gain insight into Swarm.
+
+
+## Public Gateways
+
+Swarm offers a local HTTP proxy API that Dapps can use to interact with Swarm. The Ethereum Foundation is hosting a public gateway, which allows free access so that people can try Swarm without running their own node.
+
+The Swarm public gateways are temporary and users should not rely on their existence for production services.
+
+The Swarm public gateway can be found at https://swarm-gateways.net and is always running the latest `stable` Swarm release.
+
+## Swarm Dapps
+
+You can find a few reference Swarm decentralised applications at: https://swarm-gateways.net/bzz:/swarmapps.eth
+
+Their source code can be found at: https://github.com/ethersphere/swarm-dapps
+
+## Contributing
 
 Thank you for considering to help out with the source code! We welcome contributions from
 anyone on the internet, and are grateful for even the smallest of fixes!