Table of contents

• Installation guide
• Usage
• Documentation

Installation guide

Installation of libflute consits of 3 simple steps:

1. Getting the source code
2. Build setup
3. Building

Step 1: Getting the source code

cd ~
git clone https://github.com/5G-MAG/libflute.git

Step 2: Build setup

cd libflute/
mkdir build && cd build
cmake -GNinja ..

Step 3: Building

ninja

Usage

When installing libflute, it comes with two demo applications, a receiver and a transmitter. Both applications can be found under libflute/build/examples.

Step 1: Setting up a Flute receiver

To start the Flute receiver type in

./flute-receiver

The application will listen at the multicast address 238.1.1.95 by default. Check the help page for additional options (./flute-receiver --help).

Step 2: Setting up a Flute transmitter

To start the Flute transmitter type in

./flute-transmitter -r 100000 file

For file enter a file that shall be transmitted.

The parameter -r provides a data rate limit in kbit/s.

Note: Keep in mind, the rate limit should not be set higher than the network allows, otherwise packet loss can occur (UDP transmission).

Optional: Using IPSec for secure transmission

If you want to ensure, that transmission between to parties shall be encrypted, you can activate IPSec.

Simply use the -k parameter on transmitter and receiver side with a. As IPSec key a AES 256-bit key (so 64 character long) is expected.

• Starting the receiver with IPSec key:

sudo ./flute-receiver -k fdce8eaf81e3da02fa67e07df975c0111ecfa906561e762e5f3e78dfe106498e

As soon as the receiver is starting with -k option, a policy is beeing created that ensures that incoming packets with a specific destination address (can be set with -m) are decrypted with the specified IPSec key.

You can check the policies with

sudo ip xfrm state list
sudo ip xfrm policy list

• Starting the transmitter with IPSec key:

sudo ./flute-transmitter -r 100000 -k fdce8eaf81e3da02fa67e07df975c0111ecfa906561e762e5f3e78dfe106498e file

Outgoing packages with a specific destination address (can be set with -m) will be encrypted with the specified IPSec key.

• Optional: Setting superuser rights

To allow the application to set policy entries without superuser privileges for IPSec, set its capabilites accordingly. Alternatively, you can run it with superuser rights (sudo ...).

sudo setcap 'cap_net_admin=eip' ./flute-transmitter
sudo setcap 'cap_net_admin=eip' ./flute-receiver

Documentation

Documentation of the source code can be found at: https://austrian-broadcasting-services.github.io/libflute/