How do I run the snapcraft webchat example?

Question

I downloaded the sample webchat files and created a snap package using $ snapcraft snap. How do I run the snap?

webchat files https://github.com/ubuntu-core/snapcraft/tree/master/examples/webchat

$ snap list Name Version Developer ubuntu-core 16.04+20160419.20-55 canonical webchat 0.0.1 $ webchat.run command not found $ snap webchat error: Unknown command 'webchat'

webchat does work when I call it directly as follows $ node /home/chris/software/snapcraft_test/parts/webchat/install/lib/node_modules/webchat-for-a-snap/webchat.js

Answer 1

If you take a look at the webchat example's snapcraft.yaml, you'll see this snippet:

apps:
  webchat:
    command: bin/webchat-for-a-snap
    daemon: simple
    plugs: [network-bind]

This tells Snappy that you want this command to be run as a daemon (i.e. a systemd service), which means this should be running as soon as you install it. Try this:

$ ps ax | grep webchat
  2095 ?        Ssl    0:00 node /snap/webchat/100001/bin/webchat-for-a-snap

The example is missing some documentation since it doesn't tell you how to use it, but it's simply running a webserver on port 3000, so try visiting http://localhost:3000 in your web browser.