OpenRTC Rust Core

The openrtc crate is the shared realtime engine behind OpenRTC's native and browser/WASM runtimes.

[dependencies]
openrtc = "1.0.3"

Rust 1.91 or newer is required. The default feature set is intentionally small; enable only the native transports your host ships:

openrtc = { version = "1.0.3", features = ["transport-lan"] }

It powers:

• the native runtime used by Tauri and other native hosts
• the WASM runtime loaded by the npm package in browsers

Core Responsibilities

• app-scoped device discovery
• presence publishing and cleanup
• signaling messages and sessions
• room membership
• peer identity resolution
• iroh endpoint lifecycle and connection management
• shared runtime records used by both native and WASM hosts

Native vs WASM

Native

Used for:

• Tauri desktop/mobile-style hosts
• headless or CLI-style runners
• advanced endpoint and router integration

Native-only features include:

• endpoint adoption/export
• custom router / no-internal-router mode
• native auth relay helpers
• protocol registry and plugin registration

WASM

The same runtime logic compiles to WebAssembly for browser hosts.

The npm package loads that WASM build and forwards auth/runtime configuration into it. The browser path should behave like the native path at the runtime-contract level.

Recommended Native Shape

• use ClientBuilder / injected runtime construction
• keep host-specific behavior outside the core where possible
• use the runtime manager and protocol registry for advanced native composition

Peer Sessions and Custom Protocols

The Rust core owns one peer-session view per deviceId. Host layers should consume connected peer-session snapshots rather than reason about transport records directly.

Protocol authors have two supported extension paths:

1. Session-adjacent stream composition

   • wait for a connected peer session
   • open open_bi / open_uni streams
   • define framing and message semantics externally

2. ALPN protocol plugins

   • register protocol plugins through RuntimeManager / ProtocolRegistry
   • use SessionAdjacent plugins for runtime-ready hooks without ALPN routing
   • use Alpn plugins when the native runtime should register a dedicated ALPN

WASM/browser consumers should prefer the first model. The second is a Rust-first advanced capability.

Important Rule

Rust owns discovery, signaling, presence, lifecycle, and peer identity. TypeScript should wrap those contracts, not duplicate them.

See the lifecycle ownership contract and application security and delivery contract before adding host retry, connection, admission, or delivery behavior.