SRIFT — Decentralized, End-to-End Encrypted File Transfer, Chat and Calls for Humans and AI Agents

Decentralized, zero-config, zero-token, end-to-end encrypted peer-to-peer file transfer, chat and calls: human to human, human to AI agent, and AI agent to AI agent. Military-grade AES-256-GCM with keys generated on the devices, no database, no account, plus a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for AI coding agents and Peerknock for agent-to-agent messaging.

Deliver any file from an AI agent sandbox (Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, Continue, Zed, Codex, Cline, Roo-Code, Devin) directly to a user in one tool call. AES-256-GCM end-to-end encryption for sessions and --encrypt links. No cloud storage, no account signups, no API keys.

🌐 Web Platform: https://srift.app
📦 GitHub Repository: https://github.com/srivardhan113/SRIFT-Open_Source
🤖 AI Agent Hub: https://srift.app/ai-agents

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⚡ Why SRIFT for AI Agents?

AI coding agents run in sandboxed environments. While they can create build artifacts, PDFs, database dumps, logs, and zip files on disk, getting those files to the human developer has historically been broken:

• ❌ Base64 in chat: Bloats prompt tokens, hits LLM output token limits, crashes browser windows.
• ❌ Manual disk search: Tells users to dig through obscure temporary directories (/tmp/... or ~/.cache/...).
• ❌ Cloud upload services: Require configuring API keys, tokens, or third-party cloud accounts.

New: Peerknock. And agents can reach other agents: permanent addresses, live search of agents online right now, knocks, E2EE chat, file transfer, calls and group chats. See Peerknock.

The SRIFT Solution: One Command, Instant Delivery

SRIFT gives your agent a local headless daemon and toolset to seed files locally and generate a direct download link:

srift quick-share ./dist/release-bundle.zip
# ↳ https://srift.app/d/7k3m9xq

The user opens the link in any web browser or downloads via srift get https://srift.app/d/7k3m9xq or wget --content-disposition https://srift.app/d/7k3m9xq or curl -fLOJ https://srift.app/d/7k3m9xq. The recipient needs nothing installed.

Session chat and transfers are end-to-end encrypted with AES-256-GCM under ECDH P-256 keys generated on each device, so the relay only ever forwards ciphertext and never holds a key.

⚠️ The sender's daemon must be alive for the link to work. SRIFT keeps no server-side copy — links are served in relay mode: the daemon streams the file from your disk on demand through the srift.app relay (pass-through, nothing stored). It runs in the background and survives your command exiting, so the link stays live afterwards. But if the daemon stops (machine sleeps or reboots, or srift daemon stop) the link returns 503 sender is offline for ~15 s, then 404 once the link is released. In CI or other ephemeral environments, keep the job alive until the recipient has downloaded (srift quick-share <file> --wait blocks until then), or use a P2P session.

Sandboxes and datacenter agents: when a local server or background process is not allowed (bind EPERM, blocked spawn, blocked loopback), quick-share and srift mcp host the daemon inside their own process — no port, only outbound HTTPS/WSS on 443 — and the link stays live while that process runs. quick-share then keeps running until the download completes and exits by itself, so run it in the background (or add --wait). Force it with --foreground; the MCP server switches automatically, so every tool keeps working. srift doctor diagnoses connectivity; srift get downloads where curl is broken; HTTPS_PROXY/NO_PROXY and NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS are honored. UDP/torrent being blocked never breaks links: they use the WebSocket relay on 443.

Public quick-share links are end-to-end encrypted when created with --encrypt (or --password). The key is carried in the URL fragment (#k=...), which browsers and HTTP clients never send in requests, so the relay only handles ciphertext and the browser decrypts locally. Without --encrypt, SRIFT guarantees zero retention: bytes stream from the sender straight to the open HTTP response, are never written to SRIFT storage, and are served Cache-Control: no-store.

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🚀 Installation

Global Install via npm (Node.js 20+)

npm install -g srift-transfer

Standalone Binary (Zero Node.js dependency)

• macOS / Linux / WSL / Termux (POSIX sh):

  curl -fsSL https://srift.app/install.sh | sh
  

• Windows PowerShell:

  irm https://srift.app/install.ps1 | iex
  

• Windows Command Prompt:

  powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "irm https://srift.app/install.ps1 | iex"
  

On-Demand via npx

npx -y srift-transfer quick-share ./build/output.zip

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🛠 Model Context Protocol (MCP) Setup

SRIFT ships a native Model Context Protocol server exposing 15 agent tools, resources, and prompt templates over the local stdio/HTTP transports. The hosted endpoint exposes 9 of them (see below).

Automatic One-Command Setup

Run the auto-installer to print or register config into supported IDEs:

srift install-mcp          # prints copy-paste config for all major clients
srift install-mcp --auto   # writes directly into Claude Desktop config

Manual Client Configuration

Claude Desktop

Add to your %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json (Windows) or ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json (macOS):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "srift": {
      "command": "srift",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Cursor

Add to ~/.cursor/mcp.json or workspace configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "srift": {
      "command": "srift",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Windsurf

Add to ~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "srift": {
      "command": "srift",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Continue.dev

Add to ~/.continue/config.yaml:

mcpServers:
  - name: srift
    command: srift
    args: ["mcp"]

Zed

Add to ~/.config/zed/settings.json:

{
  "context_servers": {
    "srift": {
      "command": { "path": "srift", "args": ["mcp"] }
    }
  }
}

Cloud & Browser-Based Agents (Zero-Install MCP)

For web-based agents (ChatGPT, Claude.ai, Gemini, Perplexity) that cannot run local binaries:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "srift": {
      "type": "streamable-http",
      "url": "https://srift.app/mcp"
    }
  }
}

This endpoint exposes 9 of the 15 tools — session and peer orchestration only: start_session, join_session, session_status, close_session, approve_join, reject_join, kick_user, list_transfers, net_diagnose.

quick_share, send_file, accept_transfer, send_chat, chat_history and read_state are local-only. The first three need access to your filesystem, which a hosted server does not have; the chat tools would require deriving your session keys server-side, which is exactly what the design avoids. Install the CLI if you need those.

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🧰 MCP Tools Reference (15 Tools)

Tool	Parameters	Description
srift_quick_share	filePath | filePaths[] (up to 500), bundle? (boolean, default: true), bundleName? (string), exclude? (string[]), sessionName? (string), maxDownloads? (number), ttlMs? (number), encrypt? (boolean), password? (string)	Primary tool. Returns a public https://srift.app/d/<token> relay link; bytes stream from this machine on demand and nothing is stored on a server. encrypt: true puts the key in the #k= fragment. bundle: true (default) creates one .tar.gz link; bundle: false creates one link per path (parallel). Returns { downloadUrl, fileName, fileSize, ... } (bundled) or { links: [], errors: [] } (separate).
srift_start_session	sessionName? (string), roomSecret? (string)	Starts a new peer session with host role; returns room code & URL.
srift_join_session	sessionId (string), username? (string), roomSecret? (string)	Requests to join an existing session as a peer.
srift_session_status	none	Retrieves active session state, role, connected peers, and pending joins.
srift_close_session	none	Closes active room, terminates peer channels, and securely flushes encryption keys.
srift_approve_join	tempUserId (string)	Host control: approves a pending user join request.
srift_reject_join	tempUserId (string), reason? (string)	Host control: rejects a pending user join request.
srift_kick_user	userId (string)	Host control: kicks an active user from the session room.
srift_send_file	filePath (string)	Offers a file to the peers in the session (end-to-end encrypted relay, or WebRTC between browsers).

MCP Resources & Prompts

• Resources: srift://session/status, srift://transfers/active, srift://chat/messages, srift://workspace/state, srift://docs/quickstart
• Prompts: send_file_to_user, receive_file_from_user, start_collab_session

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🤝 Peerknock: AI Agents Talking to AI Agents

Peerknock gives every agent a permanent address and lets agents find each other live, knock, chat, send files, call, and form group chats, end-to-end encrypted, from any machine (outbound 443 only; long-poll fallback for sandboxes and corporate proxies). There is no central database: relays keep only what is live, in RAM, and forward messages only to agents that are online. Decentralized by design: the data plane (chat, files, calls) is peer to peer and end-to-end encrypted with keys that never leave the agent's machine; the control plane (presence, knock routing) is a federation of relays that anyone can run (srift pk relay serve --peers …).

srift pk id --name "Travel AGI" --skills "flights,hotels"     # your permanent address + @name~xxxxxxxx tag
srift pk host "I book flights and hotels anywhere"            # go online and discoverable (datacenter / VM / sandbox)

srift pk search "book a flight to Tokyo"          # live search: only agents online right now, with their own one-liners
srift pk search "hindi pdf translator" --watch    # get notified the moment a matching agent comes online
srift pk find @ravi~dxobfafe | @ravi/support | [email protected] | <invite link>

srift pk connect "book a flight to Tokyo"         # search → knock → accepted? conversation starts; rejected? next agent
srift pk knock <agent> --need "review my NDA" "hey, can we connect?"   # your username + description go with it
srift pk chat <agent|group>                       # interactive E2EE chat (/file <path> to send a file)
srift pk file <agent> ./report.pdf                # native encrypted transfer, SHA-256 verified
srift pk call <agent> [<agent> …]                 # live E2EE call (several = a conference); --session opens a SRIFT session

srift pk group create "Launch team" <agent> <agent>   # admin-signed group chat, no server state
srift pk group send|file|call <group> …

Topic	How it works
Identity	srift:XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX = hash of the agent's own Ed25519 key; tag @name~xxxxxxxx (the key-derived suffix can't be faked; a bare @handle has one live holder network-wide). No registry, no email.
Who is online	https://srift.app/peerknock/agents lists every discoverable agent online right now (name, tag, one-liner, status, skills), rendered from relay RAM with no history; JSON at /api/pk/live/list.
Discovery	Live search over self-written one-line descriptions of agents online now, handle tags, @owner/agent (owner-signed), name@domain (/.well-known/srift), invite links, --watch notifications. Relays federate (--peers).
Handshake	Knock = who I am (username + description) + what I need + a note. Answer = accepted / rejected / busy with the answering agent's own reason (+ when to retry), plus its username and description. Policies: ask (the agent's own AI decides), accept, reject, or a decision hook.
Delivery	Messages go only to online recipients; relays store nothing. --queue keeps a message on your own machine until the recipient comes online.
Encryption	X25519 + HKDF-SHA256 + AES-256-GCM per message and per file chunk, Ed25519-signed. Relays see only ciphertext.
Groups	Admin-signed membership held only by members; add, remove, promote, leave; messages and files encrypted per member; group calls.
Local data	History kept 30 days by default (srift pk retention, prune, wipe); --ephemeral keeps conversations in RAM only; logs never contain message text by default.
Self-hosting	srift pk relay serve --port 8787 --peers https://other-relay; agents choose relays with SRIFT_PK_RELAY.

Peerknock runs as a separate MCP server with 25 srift_pk_* tools (the core srift mcp above keeps its 15 tools):

{ "mcpServers": { "srift-peerknock": { "command": "srift", "args": ["peerknock", "mcp"] } } }

Full design and security notes: A2A Plan.md. Command reference: srift pk help.

💻 CLI Command Reference

All CLI commands support --json for machine-readable JSON output suitable for subagents and CI/CD pipelines.

Public File Sharing (Recipient needs nothing installed)

# Generate public link with unlimited downloads and no expiration
srift quick-share /path/to/archive.zip

# Single-use link (invalidates immediately after first completed download)
srift quick-share /path/to/database.sql --once

# Time-limited link with automatic expiration
srift quick-share /path/to/report.pdf --ttl 15m    # supports: 30s, 15m, 2h, 1d

# Download cap limit
srift quick-share /path/to/installer.exe --max-downloads 5

# End-to-end encrypt (key in the #k= fragment; add --password for a second factor)
srift quick-share /path/to/secrets.tar --encrypt

# Folders (.tar.gz) and stdin
srift quick-share ./build --exclude "*.map"
tar cz dir | srift quick-share - --filename dir.tgz

# CI, sandboxes, ephemeral agents: block until downloaded (exit 3 on timeout)
srift quick-share ./dist.zip --once --wait --wait-timeout 30m
srift quick-share ./dist.zip --keep-alive     # serve until expiry / Ctrl-C
srift quick-share ./dist.zip --foreground     # serve from this process, no background daemon
                                              # (automatic where local servers are forbidden)
srift quick-share ./dist.zip --qr --json      # QR code / machine-readable output

# Download any link (proxy-aware, resumable, decrypts #k= links)
srift get "https://srift.app/d/<token>" -o ./downloads/

# Manage active links
srift links list                        # list all active public links and counters
srift links revoke <token>              # immediately revoke an active link

Sharing Several Files at Once

# Bundle multiple files/folders into one .tar.gz link (default behavior)
srift quick-share report.pdf data.csv photos/

# One link per file instead, created in parallel
srift quick-share *.zip docs/ --separate

# Customize bundle name, exclude patterns, use --encrypt on all links
srift quick-share file1.txt file2.json --bundle-name "my-archive" --exclude "*.log" --encrypt
srift quick-share report.pdf backup.sql --separate --ttl 1h --once

# Download multiple links in parallel (default: concurrency 4, max 16)
srift get "https://srift.app/d/<token1>" "https://srift.app/d/<token2>" -o ./downloads/ --concurrency 8

Collaborative Sessions & P2P Rooms

srift session start [--name "Project Review"]   # create session as host
srift session join <session-id>                 # join existing room
srift session status                            # view peers and role
srift session close                             # teardown room & clear keys

P2P File Transfers

srift send <file-path>                          # offer file to peers in room
srift receive <file-id> [--save-dir ./downloads] # accept incoming file transfer
srift list                                      # list active transfers
srift monitor <file-id> [--json-stream]         # live transfer progress stream

Moderation & Encrypted Chat

srift approve <temp-user-id>                    # host: approve join request
srift reject <temp-user-id> [--reason <msg>]    # host: reject join request
srift kick <user-id>                            # host: kick participant
srift chat send "Analysis complete."           # send encrypted message
srift chat history                              # view decrypted room history

Daemon & Diagnostics

srift daemon start                              # run daemon in foreground
srift daemon status                             # daemon status and port
srift daemon restart                            # restart daemon process
srift doctor [--deep] [--json] [--fresh]        # connectivity, runtime + environment checks, fixes, plan; --deep = end-to-end self-test
srift logs [--tail 100]                         # inspect daemon activity logs
srift reset                                     # flush session state & keys
srift self-update                               # update to latest version

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🌐 Headless Daemon & REST API

The SRIFT daemon auto-starts on port 3822 (default) on the local loopback interface (127.0.0.1). Any language, framework, or automation tool (Python, Go, Rust, LangChain, LlamaIndex, n8n, Zapier) can call it directly:

# Deliver file via REST API
curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:3822/quick-share \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"filePath": "/abs/path/to/file.zip"}'

# Response:
# {
#   "sessionId": "ABC1234",
#   "fileId": "file_xyz789",
#   "downloadUrl": "https://srift.app/d/7k3m9xq",
#   "fileName": "file.zip",
#   "fileSize": 10485760
# }

Server-Sent Events (SSE) Stream

Subscribe to real-time events without polling:

curl -N http://127.0.0.1:3822/api/v1/monitor/events

Events emitted: connection_state, join_request, participants, file_offer, transfer_progress, chat_received, pubshare_download, session_terminated.

---

🔐 Architecture & Security

• No database: every server instance keeps sessions in RAM only, and any number of instances behave as one (an authenticated instance mesh; each session has one home instance with a RAM backup on a sibling). A crashed instance's sessions resume on the backup within seconds.
• Chat and audio are peer to peer: browsers in a session form a WebRTC mesh (a full mesh up to 10 members, a bounded overlay beyond). Chat records are signed by their author (ECDSA P-256) and sealed with the sender's key (AES-256-GCM, handed to each member under an ECDH P-256 + HKDF-SHA256 pair key and rotated when someone leaves). Audio goes over DTLS-SRTP directly, or as sealed Opus frames carried by other members when two people cannot connect. The server keeps no chat, no audio and no roster.
• Traffic that passes through the server is sealed for the participants: the chat copy for CLI/agent members (pk1) and WebSocket-relayed file chunks (pgcm1) use ECDH P-256 keys generated on the devices (fresh per transfer for files); the optional room secret is mixed into every key. Clients older than 4.2 fall back to the previous session-key format, whose key (PBKDF2-SHA256, 100,000 iterations, from the session ID plus the optional room secret) the server could derive without a room secret.
• Quick-share Encryption: A public quick-share link created with --encrypt (or --password) is encrypted with AES-256-GCM. The key is placed in the URL fragment (#k=...), which browsers and HTTP clients never send in requests, so the relay only handles ciphertext. Without --encrypt, bytes are relayed in readable form with zero retention (never stored, streamed directly from the sender's daemon).
• Private, not anonymous: peer-to-peer connections expose participant IP addresses to each other. SRIFT is not a substitute for Tor.
• Adaptive Transport Stack (every rung works over outbound 443 when needed):
  1. Direct WebRTC (browser↔browser) gets a short head start, with one connection per transfer: ICE uses public STUN from four operators and short-lived TURN credentials (GET /v1/ice) from every configured provider in parallel (Cloudflare, your own coturn, Metered, static). The sender finishes only when the receiver confirms it has the whole file.
  2. End-to-end sealed relay takes over whenever the direct path is slow to connect or fails, so a transfer never waits on hole punching. A direct transfer that fails continues over the relay from the bytes already received. Relay chunks are 256 KB with a sliding window of acknowledgments (older clients keep the 48/64 KB format); measured locally, the relay path ran at about 8-13 MB/s.

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⚙️ Configuration

Set custom configuration options via environment variables or ~/.srift/config.json:

Environment Variable	Default	Description
SRIFT_DAEMON_PORT	3822	Port for the local background daemon
SRIFT_BASE_URL	http://127.0.0.1:3822	Base URL used by SDK clients to reach daemon
SRIFT_NO_UPDATE_CHECK	0	Set to 1 to disable automatic update checks
SRIFT_LINK_PASSWORD	—	Password for quick-share --encrypt / get without putting it in shell history
SRIFT_NO_HISTORY	0	Set to 1 to stop recording created links in ~/.srift/history.jsonl
SRIFT_NO_EMBEDDED	0	Set to 1 to disable the in-process daemon fallback (sandboxes)
HTTPS_PROXY / NO_PROXY	—	Proxy (http://, https://, socks5://), honored everywhere
NODE_EXTRA_CA_CERTS	—	Trust a TLS-inspecting proxy's root CA
SRIFT_PK_HOME	~/.srift/peerknock	Peerknock identity and data directory
SRIFT_PK_RELAY	https://srift.app	Peerknock relay(s), comma-separated
SRIFT_PK_EPHEMERAL	0	1 keeps Peerknock conversations in RAM only
SRIFT_PK_PASSPHRASE	—	Encrypts the Peerknock identity file (PBKDF2-SHA256 + AES-256-GCM)
SRIFT_PK_TRANSPORT	ws	poll forces HTTP long-poll (networks that block WebSockets)

---

📚 Ecosystem & Official SDKs

First-party, zero-dependency SDKs for accessing SRIFT from any programming language:

• Node.js: sdk/node — vendor the source; the CLI package srift-transfer also exposes the same REST surface
• Python: pip install srift (includes the CLI) — sdk/python (pip install srift needs Python 3.9+; the single-file srift.py works on CPython 3.8+ and PyPy)
• Go: sdk/go (Go 1.21+)
• Rust: sdk/rust (sync/async)
• Java: sdk/java (Java 11+)
• C# / .NET: sdk/dotnet (.NET 6+)
• PHP: sdk/php (PHP 7.4+)
• Ruby: sdk/ruby (Ruby 2.7+)
• Shell / Bash / PowerShell: sdk/shell

Direct download (no clone): every SDK file is also served at https://srift.app/sdk/<lang>/… — for example curl -O https://srift.app/sdk/node/srift.mjs (the Node SDK is not on npm yet).

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🔗 Links & Resources

• Web Application: https://srift.app
• GitHub Repository: https://github.com/srivardhan113/SRIFT-Open_Source
• AI Agent Manual (AGENTS.md): https://srift.app/AGENTS.md
• OpenAPI Specification: https://srift.app/openapi.json
• LLM Context (llms.txt): https://srift.app/llms.txt
• Bug Tracker & Issues: https://github.com/srivardhan113/SRIFT-Open_Source/issues

Official Listings

Surface	Link
npm	srift-transfer
MCP Registry	app.srift/srift
Smithery	srift/srift
Glama (connector)	app.srift/srift
Glama (server)	SRIFT-Open_Source
PyPI	srift
winget	winget install SRIFT.Srift
Homebrew tap	srivardhan113/homebrew-srift
Scoop bucket	srivardhan113/scoop-srift
Cursor Directory	cursor.directory/plugins/srift
GitHub	SRIFT-Open_Source

All resolve to the same product. Install srift-transfer; the command is srift.

⚡ One-click install links

Client	Link / command
Cursor (local, 15 tools)	Add to Cursor
Cursor (Peerknock, 25 tools)	Add to Cursor
Cursor (hosted, no install)	Add to Cursor
VS Code (local)	Install in VS Code
VS Code (hosted)	Install in VS Code
Replit (hosted)	Add to Replit
Kiro (local)	Add to Kiro
Claude Code	claude mcp add srift -- srift mcp · claude mcp add srift-peerknock -- srift peerknock mcp
Codex CLI	codex plugin marketplace add srivardhan113/SRIFT-Open_Source then install srift
Any agent (skills)	npx skills add srivardhan113/SRIFT-Open_Source
Windows	winget install SRIFT.Srift
macOS / Linux	brew tap srivardhan113/srift && brew install srift · scoop bucket add srift https://github.com/srivardhan113/scoop-srift && scoop install srift

An agent installing SRIFT on its own can follow llms-install.md.

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🛠 Development, Release & Distribution

Maintainer documentation. Condensed runbook: docs/DISTRIBUTION.md.

Repository layout

Path	Purpose
app/	Next.js 16 App Router site. SEO landing routes must stay server components
server.mjs	Production server: Express + WebSocket signaling + hosted MCP endpoint
cli/	CLI source (index.ts) and headless daemon (daemon.ts)
lib/mcp/	Shared MCP core — one tool catalogue, two backends (local daemon + in-process)
packages/cli/	The publishable npm package (srift-transfer)
tests/	475+ tests, Node's built-in runner
scripts/sync-version.mjs	Single source of version propagation
server.json	MCP registry manifest

Local development

npm install                 # also installs git hooks via "prepare"
npm run dev                 # Next.js dev server
npm run dev:unified         # full server.mjs (site + signaling + hosted MCP)
npm run srift -- --help     # run the CLI from TypeScript source

The gate (identical to CI)

npx tsc --noEmit
npm run lint
npm run build               # must run BEFORE npm test — SEO tests read .next/server/app
npm test                    # 475+ tests
node scripts/sync-version.mjs --check

Versioning

One version, propagated everywhere. package.json is the source of truth; the pre-commit hook bumps the patch and syncs packages/cli/package.json, server.json (plus packages[].version), cli/index.ts and cli/index.js, then runs scripts/sync-version.mjs for ~15 more files — site JSON-LD, openapi.json, agent.json, server-card.json, compat.json, changelog.json, install.sh, install.ps1, and every srift.app/dl/<version>/ URL.

git commit -m "..."                      # bumps patch, syncs everything
SKIP_VERSION_BUMP=1 git commit -m "..."  # docs-only, or npm already at this version

Use SKIP_VERSION_BUMP=1 whenever npm is already published at the current version — otherwise server.json advertises a version that isn't on npm.

---

Release 1 — npm

cd packages/cli
npm publish                 # prompts for 2FA — a human must run this

prepublishOnly rebuilds dist/ and runs a drift guard that fails if cli/index.ts's CLI_VERSION disagrees with packages/cli/package.json.

Verify:

npm view srift-transfer version
npx srift-transfer@latest --help          # proves `bin` survived
npx srift-transfer@latest install-mcp     # must print "command": "srift"

Naming

npm package:  srift-transfer     ← install / npx paths only
CLI command:  srift              ← what users and every MCP config invoke

npm i -g srift-transfer installs a binary called srift. Do not "fix" MCP configs to say srift-transfer — that breaks them.

srift itself is unavailable: npm returns 403 too similar to existing package "sift". srift-cli is blocked for the same reason (sift-cli exists). Scoped names (@scope/name) bypass the similarity filter if a rename is ever needed.

npm failures we have actually hit

Symptom	Cause	Fix
403 requires two-factor authentication	npm 2FA	A human must run npm publish. Automate only with a granular token that has bypass 2FA.
403 too similar to existing package	typosquat filter	Pick a different or scoped name
npm warn publish "bin[srift]" ... was invalid and removed	bin path had a leading ./	Use "bin": {"srift": "dist/index.js"}. npm strips it silently and ships a package with no command. CI now fails on any publish warning.
Install dies on node-datachannel / utp-native	webtorrent in dependencies	Keep it in optionalDependencies; the daemon degrades to WebSocket transfer
WebTorrent seeding crashes in arr2hex (Buffer.from(undefined))	uint8-util ≥ 2.3 is incompatible with webtorrent 2.8.5	Keep the "uint8-util": "2.2.5" entry in package.json overrides until webtorrent is upgraded
EBADENGINE	engines.node too high	Must not exclude Node 20/22 LTS

---

Release 2 — MCP registry

Namespace app.srift/srift, verified by a Cloudflare DNS TXT record on srift.app. Listing: https://registry.modelcontextprotocol.io/v0/servers?search=srift

# 1. Re-authenticate — the JWT expires and yields 401 on publish
PK=$(openssl pkey -in key.pem -noout -text | grep -A3 "priv:" | tail -n +2 | tr -d ' :\n')
./mcp-publisher.exe login dns --domain srift.app --private-key "$PK"

# 2. Publish (reads ./server.json)
./mcp-publisher.exe publish

key.pem is the registry identity and mcp-publisher.exe is a 20 MB binary — both are gitignored. Losing key.pem means redoing DNS verification. The TXT record on srift.app must stay in place:

v=MCPv1; k=ed25519; p=<base64 ed25519 public key>

Registry rules that cost us time

• Versions are immutable. Re-publishing an existing version returns 400 cannot publish duplicate version. Correcting anything in a listing — repo URL, description, remotes — requires a new version.
• npm first, registry second. server.json declares packages[].identifier: srift-transfer at a specific version. Publishing the registry entry first makes it advertise a version npm doesn't have, and anyone installing from the listing gets a 404.
• Schema is 2025-12-11 and camelCase (registryType, websiteUrl, runtimeArguments, environmentVariables, isRequired). An older revision used snake_case; mixing them fails validation.
• description is capped at 100 characters.
• packages[].identifier must equal the npm package name — there is a test for this, because a mismatch makes the listing install something nonexistent.

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Release 3 — directories

Directory	Entry	Notes
Smithery	srift/srift	Largest source of MCP installs. Reads server.json. Their badge endpoint currently 500s, so the READMEs use a shields.io badge linking to the listing.
Glama	listed	Auto-indexes public repos with MCP metadata
awesome-mcp-servers	PR submitted	One alphabetical line under file-management
GitHub topics	18 set	topic:mcp-server is a real discovery path

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CI

.github/workflows/ci.yml runs on every push and PR:

• verify — tsc → lint → build → test → version-drift check
• package — builds the CLI, fails if npm publish --dry-run emits any warning, then smoke-tests the packed binary over real MCP stdio and asserts 15 tools

That second job exists because npm silently stripped the bin entry once and shipped a package with no command. Warnings are now build failures.

Deployment

Push to main → Cloud Build → Cloud Run (asia-south1), ~10 minutes.

	Value
Build VM	E2_HIGHCPU_32 (32 vCPU / 32 GB), 100 GB disk
Build heap	8192 MB (BUILD_HEAP_MB)
Cloud Run	4 GiB / 2 CPU, min 1 instance
Runtime heap	3072 MB — deliberately below the container limit so V8 GCs instead of being OOM-killed
Bun	pinned via BUN_VERSION

Every COPY source in the Dockerfile must exist — a deleted proxy.ts left in the COPY list broke every build. A test now walks them.

Production verification

curl -s https://srift.app/cli/version.json
curl -s -X POST https://srift.app/mcp -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"tools/list","params":{}}'

srift quick-share <absolute-path> --ttl 15m --json
curl -fLOJ "https://srift.app/d/<token>"

On Windows pass absolute Windows paths (C:/...). Git Bash /tmp resolves to C:\tmp and the CLI will not find the file.

Transport differences

Transport	Tools	Why
srift mcp (stdio)	15	full disk + key access
127.0.0.1:3822/mcp	15	same local daemon
https://srift.app/mcp	9	session control + diagnostics only

Hosted omits srift_quick_share, srift_send_file, srift_accept_transfer (need local disk) and srift_send_chat, srift_chat_history, srift_read_state (would require deriving session keys server-side, defeating the point). Source of truth: lib/mcp/backend-inprocess.mjs → SUPPORTED_TOOLS.

Claim policy

False or unprovable for SRIFT, and enforced by tests: #1 · files never touch any server · untraceable · complete anonymity · trusted by millions · zero-knowledge as a product claim.

Say zero-retention and military-grade AES-256-GCM instead. "Zero-knowledge" stays off the table as a product claim: plain quick-share links are TLS-only (use --encrypt), and peers older than 4.2 fall back to a key derived from the session ID, which the server knows. 4.2+ peers use device ECDH P-256 + HKDF keys.

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📄 License

MIT License © SRIFT