Voice: Discord-style voice and video rooms, now bundled with Discourse 🎙

[satonotdead]

Hi, no problem. I’m glad you found it! Is it enough for what you were looking for? I’d like to know your perspective if you want to.

[newkid (Chris)]

Thanks for all your amazing work everyone. Very excited about Voice for our real estate community .

[Jagster (Jakke Flemming)]

Can I, as an admin, delete rooms?

[satonotdead]

Yes, you can also change their title, slug, and limit them to specific groups.

It is really well done and worth a try. You will probably end up using it.

[Jagster (Jakke Flemming)]

I should be more strict I know where and how to edit all those details, but how do I remove rooms? Or am I stuck on some early stage resenha phase…

[satonotdead]

I think you need to just use the sidebar or look for the Resenha tab in enabled plugins. It should be straightforward.

[Jagster (Jakke Flemming)]

Thanks, it could done from rooms-tab of settings indeed. I was looking at forum GUI only

[MiniForum]

On a self-hosted Discourse, It is working beautifully for a few persons, thanks a lot !

If we want to have more people (40 or more), I suppose I have to install a Livekit media server ?

Is there any reason I could not install it on the same server which is currently running Discourse (through Docker) ?

I installed Discourse on a dedicated VPS using the “Beginner Docker install guide” so everything was automated.

So I am a bit reluctant to modify anything on the server, as it can break further update/upgrade. But if there is a safe way to install Livekit and to therefore easily allow large calls, I’m all in.

Thanks !

[satonotdead]

@MiniForum

Is there any reason I could not install it on the same server which is currently running Discourse (through Docker) ?

If your server has enough resources for running both, I think you should do it. Falco suggested installing the LiveKit server to power up Voice; I am finishing my own installation these days

Keep in mind that you will need to secure your Docker network/bridge/endpoints, and it is mandatory to run some tests before announcing it in production. The LiveKit installation can be done, but you could end up resolving some issues before getting it finished.

[NateDhaliwal]

@MiniForum

Is there any reason I could not install it on the same server which is currently running Discourse (through Docker) ?

Hi there, did you see this?

Run other websites on the same machine as Discourse

If you want to run other websites on the same machine as Discourse, you need to set up an extra NGINX or HAProxy proxy in front of the Docker container. NOTE: This is for advanced admins This guide assumes you already have Discourse working - if you don’t, it may be hard to tell whether or not the configuration is working. You cannot use ./discourse-setup to set up Discourse if another server is using port 80 or 443. You will need to copy and edit samples/standalone.yml with your favorite tex…

[MiniForum]

@satonotdead I would be very interested to hear about your finished installation !

Perhaps you can write about what you did to achieve a working and secure installation ?

Thanks !

[MiniForum]

Thanks for the reference.

I have to read more about Livekit but it seems that it is not a website but rather service which is running.

So perhaps we don’t need to have Nginx in front of it, but we just need to open a port ?

Anyway just curious if anyone has done it and is willing to share experience.

[satonotdead]

@MiniForum

Perhaps you can write about what you did to achieve a working and secure installation ?

Well, although I’m not an expert, I have pending to share my latest findings and discoveries in Discourse. Mainly from trial and error

I will gladly share this information after finishing it and when I have time to do so. The point with self-hosting is that each server is managed personally, so security configurations vary from one server to another.

In my case, I use Nginx as a reverse proxy; others use Nginx Proxy, Caddy, Traefik, and so on. Additionally, some of us prefer to use a shared network from Docker, while others use their native bridge (so that all applications can see each other).

The most important thing when hosting Livekit is to set the secrets, set correct permissions, and harden the template that Docker uses, to limit everything as much as possible. Since it’s a public network and the project itself is in early stages of development, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

@MiniForum

I have to read more about Livekit but it seems that it is not a website but rather service which is running.

I think they offer a Cloud service, but self-hosting is more than a website (!)

LiveKit is composed of several layers: API services, routing for node discovery, a central RTC that manages rooms and participants, multimedia processing (SFU) that handles RTP forwarding and adaptive streaming, storage for caching (such as Redis), and an infrastructure layer that includes telemetry and configuration.

@MiniForum

So perhaps we don’t need to have Nginx in front of it, but we just need to open a port ?

Maybe someone from the Discourse team or a more experienced user can correct me if I’m wrong, but I understand that in this case it would be necessary (or a similar tool) for you to have the required subdomains to connect.

Either way, you could also do it internally, but for certain actions, certificates are required and locally generated ones don’t always work.

[Falco]

@MiniForum

we want to have more people (40 or more), I suppose I have to install a Livekit media server ?

If those 40 people will be broken into smaller groups, each on its own room, or in the same room but in different times, you don’t need livekit.

If you want to do 40 people in the same room at the same time all using video, yes, you will need livekit.

@MiniForum

there any reason I could not install it on the same server which is currently running Discourse (through Docker) ?

For this number of simultaneous users you will probably want a much beefier server than the one you use for Discourse.

[satonotdead]

@Falco

For this number of simultaneous users you will probably want a much beefier server than the one you use for Discourse.

Could they be handled by LiveKit? Or would installing something like Jitsi result in cases like this being mandatory?

[Falco]

@satonotdead

Could they be handled by LiveKit?

Yes, it can as long as the underlying server running said LiveKit can.

[angus (Angus McLeod)]

I love it

Albeit, I think there’s perhaps a better name for it than ‘voice’ that naturally turns this into a adverb (or even a verb) as part of a normal english sentence and encompasses video as well, i.e. have a live discourse, go to a live Discourse, we’re having live(ly) Discourse, we just had a live(ly) Discourse etc. This semantic advantage isn’t similarly available to Discord.

[SkyeDragon (Skye)]

This looks amazing! And will indeed be huge as people migrate off of Discord and have been looking for a similar featureset.

One thing I’d like to ask as someone who has reviewed a great many voip + screenshare solutions, does this solution allow the viewer to adjust the volume of each speaker + screenshare independently? This might sound like an obvious feature, but a major limitation of most non-discord solutions is they often mux the audio stream together, making it impossible for the end user to mute a game stream or modify volumes to be more audible.

[Falco]

Yes, just right click any participant to adjust their audio accordingly.

I’ve spent a tens of thousands of hours on voice call software, endured ones like Mumble that didn’t allow for individual local volume per peer for too long. Couldn’t commit the same mistake.

[SkyeDragon (Skye)]

That is awesome! I’m going to install it and try it out

Though minor note, you are misremembering slightly: Mumble does support per-stream volume, even letting you boost past 100%. (It doesn’t have video at all though)