For about six months, I thought about creating a program to manage a computer through a browser. I started with a simple single-socket HTTP server that transmitted images to the browser and received cursor coordinates for control.
At a certain stage, I realized that WebRTC technology is well-suited for these purposes. Chrome browser has such a solution, which is installed through an extension. However, I wanted to create a lightweight program that would work without installation.
Initially, I tried using the library provided by Google, but after compilation, it occupied 500MB. I had to implement the entire WebRTC stack almost from scratch; I managed to fit everything into an exe file size of 2.5MB. A friend helped with the JS interface, and here’s what I ended up with.
Launching the program:
Open the link in a browser tab and gain full access to the desktop:
A small animation of the connection setup process:
Supported browsers: Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera.
There is the ability to transfer audio, conduct audio calls, manage the clipboard, transfer files, and trigger hotkeys.
During the development of the program, I had to study a dozen RFCs and understand that there is not enough information available on the operation of the WebRTC protocol online. I want to write an article on the technologies used in it and would like to know which of the following questions interest the community:
- SDP protocol for describing media streams
- ICE candidates and establishing a connection between two points, STUN and TURN server
- DTLS connection and key transmission in RTP session
- RTP and RTCP protocols with encryption for media data transmission
- Transmission of H264, VP8, and Opus over RTP
- SCTP connection for transmitting binary data
Kilde: habr.com
