Run it locally

This page brings up the whole of DigiFIR on one developer machine: the Fabric network, the four chaincodes, the backend and an app. It takes about 15 minutes the first time.

Prerequisites

• Linux or macOS with bash, Docker with Compose v2 (give Docker 4 GB of memory), and about 16 GB of RAM.
• Node.js 22.12 or newer and openssl.
• Go 1.27.3, or any Go that can fetch it with GOTOOLCHAIN=go1.27.3.
• Flutter for the apps; Dart 3.13 for the Dart SDK.
• The seven repositories side by side in one folder (see Repositories).

1. Start the network

cd digifir-network
./scripts/network.sh up               # 5 CAs, 3 orderers, 6 peers, 6 CouchDB (about 1 minute)
./scripts/network.sh createChannel    # channel firnational

To check the network on its own, ./scripts/network.sh all also deploys a sample chaincode and runs the 53-check smoke test.

2. Deploy the chaincodes and bootstrap them

cd ../digifir-chaincode
make deploy-dev                        # builds and deploys the four chaincodes (about 3 minutes)
cd integration && DIGIFIR_INTEGRATION=1 go test -count=1 -run '^TestBootstrap$' ./...

The bootstrap initialises the network on the ledger, onboards both states, and creates registrars, gateway keys, reference data, officials and a test citizen. It can be run again safely.

3. Run the backend

cd ../digifir-backend
npm ci
npm run deps:up                        # PostgreSQL 16, Redis 7, SeaweedFS
npm run migrate
scripts/dev-network-env.sh -o .env.network   # the network profile: gateways, peers, TLS material
npm run dev:network                    # api on :8080, projector and worker
curl http://127.0.0.1:8080/healthz

Every setting has a development default, and every outside system runs on its simulator. Without a network profile the backend still starts, but answers every write with 503 NOT_CONFIGURED. Nothing pretends a transaction committed.

Process	Port
api	8080 (REST and events), 9464 (health and metrics)
projector	9465 (health and metrics)
worker	9466 (health and metrics)

4. Run an app

Each app runs in demo mode with no backend at all, which is the quickest way to see it:

cd ../digifir-police-app
flutter pub get
flutter run --dart-define=BACKEND=demo

To run it against your local backend instead, give the backend's address:

flutter run --dart-define=API_BASE_URL=http://10.0.2.2:8080

10.0.2.2 is the host machine as seen from the Android emulator; on a desktop or iOS simulator use http://127.0.0.1:8080. Debug builds may use plain HTTP; release builds need HTTPS. Each app's docs/03-backend-setup.md and docs/06-local-backend.md (the police app: 05-local-backend.md) have the details, including test identities for the citizen app (--dart-define=IDENTITY_SIMULATOR=true).

The citizen web portal:

cd ../digiFIR-citizen-app/portal
npm ci
npm run dev                            # http://localhost:5173, demo mode without a backend address

5. Watch it

cd ../digifir-network
./scripts/network.sh monitor up       # Grafana on http://localhost:3000
./scripts/network.sh status           # containers, health, Raft leader, heights, chaincodes

Run monitor up again after starting the backend so its processes are scraped too.

Run the test suites

Suite	Command
Backend unit and integration	npm test in digifir-backend
Backend on the network	npm run smoke:network, DIGIFIR_NETWORK=1 npm run e2e:network, DIGIFIR_NETWORK=1 npm run load:network
Chaincode	make test; make integration (about 22 minutes from nothing)
Network	./scripts/network.sh smoke; ./scripts/network.sh monitor check
Apps	flutter test in each app

Tear it down

cd digifir-network
./scripts/network.sh down             # containers, volumes, crypto, channel artefacts
cd ../digifir-backend && npm run deps:down

CAUTION

The development network uses well-known passwords and keeps private keys in plain files. It publishes its ports on 127.0.0.1 only. Never expose it to another network.

Sources: digifir-network README.md; digifir-chaincode README.md; digifir-backend README.md, docs/DEVELOPMENT.md, docs/NETWORK.md; each app's docs/02-run-the-app.md on the migration branch.