Urbit

Urbit is a new computing environment designed from scratch.

At present urbit is under heavy development. It's not useful for any external purpose. Documentation is completely inadequate. Anyone can use the interpreter, of course, but the network is invitation-only.

If you're interested in keeping in touch or following the project you can:

• Enter your email address at urbit.org.
• Subscribe to the urbit-dev mailing list.
• Follow @urbit_ on Twitter.
• Get in touch with us via email, urbit@urbit.org

All of the source code is distributed under the MIT license.

Install from packages

OS X - Homebrew

brew install --HEAD homebrew/head-only/urbit

Ubuntu or Debian

Third-party package files are maintained at https://github.com/yebyen/urbit-deb.

Urbit is only supported on jessie onward (but outgoing HTTPS requests only work on stretch).

Install by hand

urbit depends on:

gcc
gmp
libsigsegv
openssl
automake
autoconf
ragel
cmake
re2c
libtool
libssl-dev (Linux only)
ncurses (Linux only)

Ubuntu or Debian

sudo apt-get install libgmp3-dev libsigsegv-dev openssl libssl-dev libncurses5-dev git make exuberant-ctags automake autoconf libtool g++ ragel cmake re2c

note: http requests are not supported on debian jessie due to an ssl issue

Fedora

sudo dnf install gcc gcc-c++ git gmp-devel openssl-devel openssl ncurses-devel libsigsegv-devel ctags automake autoconf libtool ragel cmake re2c

AWS

sudo yum --enablerepo epel install gcc gcc-c++ git gmp-devel openssl-devel ncurses-devel libsigsegv-devel ctags automake autoconf libtool cmake re2c

OS X - Homebrew

brew install git gmp libsigsegv openssl libtool autoconf automake cmake

OS X - Macports

sudo port install git gmp libsigsegv openssl autoconf automake cmake

Although automake/autoconf/libtool are generally installed by default, some have reported needing to uninstall and reinstall those three packages, at least with Homebrew. Your mileage may vary.

FreeBSD

pkg install git gmake gmp libsigsegv openssl automake autoconf ragel cmake re2c libtool

Build

Clone the repo:

git clone git://github.com/urbit/urbit.git

cd to the directory you just created:

cd urbit

Just run make:

make

(On FreeBSD, use gmake instead.)

Run (with a network invitation)

Your invitation is a planet (32-bit urbit), with a name like ~fintud-macrep, and a ticket (sekrit code), like ~fortyv-tombyt-tabsen-sonres. Run

bin/urbit -w fintud-macrep -t fortyv-tombyt-tabsen-sonres

Your pier (all Urbit state, log and checkpoint) will be in ./fintud-macrep. You can move it, and it's portable. Doing rm -r fintud-macrep/.urb/chk will delete the checkpoint, meaning all your events need to be recomputed, but making the image smaller.

To quit Urbit (without destroying any data, since Urbit is a database): ^D.

To start ~fintud-macrep again, omit the -w and -t flags:

bin/urbit fintud-macrep

Run (without a network invitation)

bin/urbit -c mypier

Urbit will create a comet (128-bit urbit) in mypier.

To quit Urbit (without destroying any data, since Urbit is a database): ^D. Note that you can kill your urbit process as nastily as you want,

To start your comet again, omit the -c flag:

bin/urbit mypier

Getting started

Your urbit is a Web server, so the best place to read about it is in your browser.

Urbit prints the HTTP port it's serving when it starts up:

http: live (insecure) on 8080

8080 is the default. If you're running on AWS or another cloud service, this port may be firewalled; go to the firewall configuration to open it.

Learn these two control keys first:
Press ^v

Basics

^v will switch between the task manager and the focussed process. ^x will switch between processes.

To start a process that is not yet started, run *proc from the task manager.

To connect your console to a process that has already been started, run +proc from the task manager. Note that the process must be one that supports console access, such as dojo and talk.

^d will exit the pier from the task manager. No matter how you shut your urbit down you'll be returned to exactly the same state as when you turned it off.

Talk

If you're on the network, you can use its most basic application, talk.

If talk is not running, start it with *talk from the task manager.

Use ^x to switch to the talk prompt and then run

;join ~doznec/urbit-meta

to join the urbit-meta channel. People in there are helpful.

There are three main talk commands:

;join ~urbit-name/channel

;join subscribes your main feed to a remote channel.

;<number>

;<number> activates a previous message number, like a URL that got clipped.

;<target>

;<target> sets the target for your messages, such as ;~urbit-name for a private message.

Filesystem Sync

The Urbit filesystem, %clay doesn't automatically sync to unix. If you'd like to browse the contents of your Urbit from unix you'll need to use |mount.

|mount creates a mirror in unix of files from %clay that is always watching for changes. To sync your entire home/ desk run:

|mount %

you should see a directory called home/ get created inside your pier. When you change files in this directory the changes will get synced into your urbit.

Since each mount point is always watching for changes you may also want to unmount from time to time.

The full syntax is as follows (from dojo):

|mount <path-in-clay> [<mount-name>]

The <mount-name> is optional and defaults to the last part of the <path-in-clay>.

|unmount <mount-name>

or:

|unmount <path-in-clay>

Sysadmin

For the most part, updates to the system are automatically synced to your urbit across the network.

When we make updates to the interpreter you should be able to shut down your urbit and:

git pull origin master
make
bin/urbit pier

where pier is the name of your pier.

While the network is still young from time to time we reboot the entire universe. We call this a 'continuity breach' since we're breaking the continuity of our crypto.

When this happens you'll need to back up your data and start a fresh pier. Your original ticket will still work.

Contributing

The first step in contributing to urbit is to come and join us on :talk.

For more detailed instructions check out contributing.md,.