v0.8.0 — DataChannel & Mesh Multi-party (2025-12-18)

Type: feat Impact: High

Summary

Major feature release introducing peer-to-peer text chat, multi-party Mesh architecture, and security enhancements. This version transforms the project from a simple 1-on-1 demo to a full-featured multi-user communication platform.

✨ New Features

💬 DataChannel Chat

Peer-to-peer messaging — No server relay for text messages
Send button & Enter key — Intuitive message sending
System notifications — Connection status updates in chat
Per-peer channels — Individual DataChannels for each connection

👥 Multi-party Mesh Architecture

Room member list — Real-time participant display
Dynamic PeerConnection management — Automatic connection handling
Video grid layout — Responsive layout for multiple remote streams
Up to 50 participants — Per-room limit for performance

📺 Enhanced Media Features

Screen sharing — Display capture with automatic video replacement
Local recording — MediaRecorder integration with WebM export
Multi-party adaptations — All features work with multiple peers

🔒 Security Enhancements

Origin validation — WebSocket origin whitelist via WS_ALLOWED_ORIGINS
Identity verification — Server-validated client IDs
Heartbeat mechanism — ping/pong keepalive for connection health

🔧 Implementation Details

Frontend Architecture

Unified state machine — Predictable connection lifecycle
Multi-PeerConnection support — Map<string, Peer> for managing peers
Perfect negotiation — Collision-free offer/answer handling

Backend Improvements

Connection cleanup sequence — Prevents panic on rapid re-join
Origin parsing — Flexible CORS-like origin validation

📁 Files Changed

internal/signal/hub.go        ← Origin validation, heartbeat
cmd/server/main.go            ← WS_ALLOWED_ORIGINS parsing
web/app.js                    ← Major restructure for Mesh
web/index.html                ← Chat UI, member list
docs/signaling.md             ← Updated protocol docs
README.md                     ← Updated feature list

🔌 Configuration

New environment variable:

# WebSocket origin validation
WS_ALLOWED_ORIGINS=localhost,yourdomain.com

# Use '*' to allow all origins (development only)
WS_ALLOWED_ORIGINS=*

🎯 Migration Guide

For Existing Users

Update environment variables to include WS_ALLOWED_ORIGINS
No code changes required
Existing 1-on-1 calls continue to work

For New Features

Join a room with multiple participants
Click member IDs to initiate calls
Use chat box for text messaging
Try screen share and recording

🐛 Known Limitations

Mesh topology — Each participant relays media to all others (N-1 connections)
Browser performance — Large rooms (20+) may strain client devices
No server-side media — Pure P2P, no recording or processing on server

🔮 Future Work

SFU architecture for large-scale calls (100+)
Selective forwarding for bandwidth optimization
Server-side recording capabilities

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