Chat-Application

A sockets based python Tkinter chat application

An updated version of my previous chat application.

Demo Video: https://github.com/jacob1st/Chat-Application/assets/87782445/47e01bc8-d9da-42e9-af37-da9b62cf8992

Running the application:

First download the three files in the repository, make sure that the client and preferances folder are in the same directory.

To host the server on a LAN:

• Check the IP address of the machine that will be hosting the server: If on windows, open CMD and run "ipconfig". On Linux, open Terminal and run "ifconfig".
• You can leave the ADDR variable in server.py blank, and simply run the file. This will start up the server.
• To connect from another machine from the same LAN, change the ADDR variable in client.py to the IP address from before, then run the file.

To host the server publicly:

• You should set up port forwarding on your router so incoming requests to your router to a specific port can be forwarded to the right machine (the one hosting the server)
• I recommend looking up a tutorial to do this properly.
• Connecting to the server will be done the same way, however you must connect using the router's (public) IP, not the hosting machine's private one.

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Documentation (sort of)

Some notes about how the server and client should communiate. Feel free to make your own Client to communicate with the server. (The server requires further error-handling for incorrect clients, so until them expect some server crashes)

Messages will be sent using the following protocal:

• Any message sent by the client will be followed by a response from the server.
• The server doesn't expect any reponse from the client to its messages, therefore any will be treated as a new message to respond to
• All requests should be encoded/decoded using utf-8

Messages from the client/server will be formatted as follows:

• reason,parameters,content
• The term "reason" is used to mean the first section of the requests. A list of possible "reasons" can be found below.
• Parameters will be defined with an "=" and separated with a ";". EX: foo=bar;key=value
• For example: to establish a connection, the client will send CON,nickname=nick;password=pass;color=#FFFFFF, to which the server will respond:
• CONVER,time=YYYY-MM-DD HH-MM-SS,OK. If there are errors, it will be sent as: CONVER,time=YYYY-MM-DD HH-MM-SS,error...
• Messages sent to everyone in the chat will be formatted as (client then server respectively)
• CHAT,rec=-ALL,your message here, server will respond to everyone in turn: CHATR,time=YYYY-MM-DD HH-MM-SS;sender=user;rec=-ALL;color=senders color,your message here
• Note: -ALL is to differentiate from a possible user nickname (nicknames cannot start with a non-letter or number)
• Client and server must format their responses with escape characters before sending.
• Any commas ,, semi-colons ;, equals = or forward slashes / should be escaped using a preliminary forward slash /.
• A nickname of foo,bar should be sent as nickname=foo/,bar.
• A nickname of foo/bar must be sent as nickname=foo//bar.
• Escaping characters should only be done in the parameters section of the request.
• The "reason" section should never have special characters, and anything after the second non-escaped comma will be read as is, as the content.
• An escape character followed by a regular character will have no affect.

Acceptable reasons from the client:

Reason	Parameters	Explanation
CON	nickname, password, color	Initial message after connecting to the server
	Example Usage:	"CON,nickname=my nick;password=my pass;color=#FFFFFF,"
CHAT	rec	Message to send
	Example Usage:	"CHAT,rec=-ALL,your message goes here"
UPDATE	nickname, password, color	Changing something about your account
	Example Usage:	"UPDATE,nickname=new nickname;color=#FF00FF,"
DISCON		Disconnecting from the chat
	Example Usage:	"DISCON,,"
REF		Refreshing the client; requests previous messages to be resent
	Example Usage:	"REF,,"
USER		Requests a list of all logged in users, and admins
	Example Usage:	"USER,,"
KICK	user	Kicks a user out of the chat (admin required)
	Example Usage:	"KICK,user=foo,You have been kicked for spamming"

Reponses from the server:

Reason	Parameters	Explanation
CONVER	time	verifying a connection. The content will either be "OK" or an error
CHATR	time, sender, rec, color	A chat message sent by a user
CONFIRM	time, reason	A confirmation for an UDPATE, REF, or DISCON request
INFO	time, sender	A public change to a user always sent to everyone (joining, leaving, changing name, etc...)
ERR	time	Client request resulted in an error
WARN	time	Something from the server changed or resulted in an error
USER	time, num, admin, *	Usually after an INFO, the parameters will list the current users

• Further explanation on the user tag:

  Example: "USER,admin=3;num=4;1=user1;2=admin;3=user3;4=user4;admin0=admin;admin1=admin1;admin2=admin2,Current Users." num tells how many users are logged in. Each one will be listed with increment keys. admin tells the number of admins, regardless of if they are logged in or not. Admins that are logged in will be listed twice in the list.