Getting Started

ThingsJS is packaged as an NPM module; you will need to have Node.js installed on the machines you would like to use ThingsJS on.

Installation

Option 1

1. git clone ThingsJS

    ~$ git clone https://github.com/DependableSystemsLab/ThingsJS.git
   

2. Navigate into the directory and npm install to install dependencies.

3. npm link to set the global node_modules to point to the project.

4. Finally, npm link things-js to enable ThingsJS to find itself.

5. Check if everything works by typing npm test.

~$ git clone https://github.com/DependableSystemsLab/ThingsJS.git
~$ cd ThingsJS
~/ThingsJS$ npm install
~/ThingsJS$ npm link
~/ThingsJS$ npm link things-js
~/ThingsJS$ npm test

Option 2

You can install via the following NPM command:

~$ sudo npm install -g things-js

• You may omit the sudo depending on your NodeJS install settings.
• You need the -g (global installation) option for using the CLI. If you don't plan on using the CLI, you can omit the -g option.

Using the CLI

Commands available currently:

• things-js pubsub - Start a MQTT Publish/Subscribe Server
• things-js dashboard - Start the Web Dashboard
• things-js worker {config} - Start a ThingsJS worker
• things-js instrument {code} - Instrument the given user code into a live-migratable version.

Starting a Pubsub Server

~$ things-js pubsub

Starting the Web Dashboard

~$ things-js dash

#OR

~$ things-js dashboard

By default it connects to MQTT at localhost:1883, MongoDB at localhost:27017/things_dashboard, and listens on localhost:3000. To start the dashboard with a different configuration, you can use the -c or --config options with the config file path provided as an argument. e.g.

~$ things-js dash -c my_config.conf

This will start a web-application served at the specified port. You can watch the demo of the Dashboard here:

Click Image to see Demo Video

Starting a ThingsJS worker:

To start a ThingsJS worker, first you need to create a directory that will provide the NodeJS environment. This is because the worker needs to have a reference to the things-js module and any other npm modules that a ThingsJS user (developer) may require. If the worker cannot find a link to a node_modules directory, it will throw an error.

~$ mkdir hello_things
~$ cd hello_things
~$ npm link things-js

#create a config file for the worker first (e.g. node_00.conf) 

~/hello_things$ things-js worker node_00.conf

The configuration file is a required argument for starting the worker. It should contain the following information:

{
    "pubsub_url": "mqtt://localhost",
    "id": "node_00",
    "device": "raspberry-pi3"
}

To instrument raw JavaScript code into a "ThingJS-compatible" code:

~$ things-js inst my_code.js

#OR

~$ things-js instrument my_code.js

By default the output file will have the same file name, with the extension .things.js. To specify the output file name, provide the optional argument with -o or --output. e.g.

~$ things-js inst my_code.js -o my_code.instrumented.js