Blert

Blert is a PvM tracking and analytics platform for Old School RuneScape, supporting Theatre of Blood, Colosseum, Inferno, and more.

This repository contains the codebase for the Blert website and backend services.

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Project Structure

blert/
├── common/             # Shared utilities and modules
├── proto/              # Shared .proto files (git submodule)
├── web/                # Frontend web app
├── socket-server/      # WebSocket event server
├── challenge-harder/   # Challenge lifecycle and processing (Rust)
├── live-server/        # Live challenge streaming server (Rust)
├── effect-runner/      # Post-challenge side effects (e.g. webhooks)
├── blertbank/          # Blertcoin accounts and ledger
└── compose.yaml        # Local development stack

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Setting up Blert locally

Follow these steps to get a full Blert development environment running.

1. Start the containers

docker compose up

This runs the websocket server, the challenge server, the effect runner, Blertbank, the database, and Redis.

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2. Prepare the database

You can either import sample data or initialize a fresh schema.

Option 1: Import a sample database dump

If you have a sample dump (e.g. blert-sample-data.zip):

1. Place the .data directory into the root of your Blert repository.

2. Import the SQL dump:

   psql 'postgres://blert:blert@localhost:5433/blert' -f blert-dump.sql
   

This loads a prebuilt dataset containing recorded ToB raid entries and a test user.

Option 2: Create a fresh schema

If you don’t have a dump, you can create a new empty schema with:

export BLERT_DATABASE_URI='postgres://blert:blert@localhost:5433/blert'
npm run -w common migration:run

3. Install Node.js and Rust

Install Node v26.5.0 using nvm:

nvm install 26.5.0
nvm use

The Rust services (challenge-harder and live-server) build on stable Rust. Their build scripts compile the shared .proto files, so protoc must be on your path as well.

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

# e.g. on Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt-get install protobuf-compiler

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4. Install dependencies and build services

npm install
npm run -w common build
npm run -w socket-server build

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5. Configure the web environment

A default environment file, web/.env.development, is included in the repository for local Docker-based development.

BLERT_DATABASE_URI=postgres://blert:blert@localhost:5433/blert
BLERT_REDIS_URI=redis://localhost:6379
AUTH_SECRET=blert

Additional required paths

There are two extra environment variables needed by the web app, pointing to directories in your filesystem.

If you imported a data dump, these directories should already exist. Otherwise, create .data/challenges and .data/web in the root of your Blert repository.

Create web/.env.local and specify:

BLERT_DATA_REPOSITORY=file:///path/to/blert/web/.data/challenges
BLERT_WEB_REPOSITORY=file:///path/to/blert/web/.data/web

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6. Start the web app

In a separate terminal, run:

nvm use
npm run -w web dev

Visit http://localhost:3000 to verify the frontend is running.

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7. Create a local account

Once the site is running, open it in your browser and register a new account. This creates a user in your local database.

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(Optional) Recording your own data

If you want to record and submit your own data using a local Blert plugin:

1. Generate an API key

   Visit http://localhost:3000/settings/api-keys while logged in and create a new API key.

2. Connect your Blert plugin

   Point your local Blert plugin to ws://localhost:3003, then paste your API key into its settings and start recording. Your data will stream into your local instance.

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Local development with Docker

The root of this repository includes a Docker compose file for running the backend services required by Blert.

Start the development servers

docker compose up

This starts the following services:

• Websocket server — ws://localhost:3003
• Challenge processing server — http://localhost:3019
• Blertbank — http://localhost:3013
• Effect runner — single metrics endpoint at http://localhost:3071/metrics
• Postgres — localhost:5433
• Redis — localhost:6379

The web frontend is run separately.

Optional services

Some services are behind compose profiles and are not started by default:

# Live challenge streaming on http://localhost:3010
docker compose --profile live up

# Prometheus (9090), Grafana (3001), and Loki (3100)
docker compose --profile observability up

# Umami analytics on http://localhost:3011
docker compose --profile analytics up

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Running Tests

You can run each Node service's tests from the root via the test command in the service's workspace, or Rust services via cargo:

npm run -w socket-server test
cargo test -p challenge-harder

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License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.