ipx/docs/configuration.md

# Configuration

Two places. **config.toml** holds what ipx needs before it reaches its database, and what decides
who gets in: where things are (`download_dir`, `socket`, `organize`), `[torrent]` and `[web]`.
**The database** holds the catalogue of feeds (`[feeds.<id>]` below) and the server settings the
admin page edits (`schedule`, `max_total_gb`, `max_age_days`, `max_new_per_check`,
`media_types`, `art_cache_mb`). Change those in the web UI, or with `ipx add`, `ipx rm` and `ipx import`; they
take effect without a restart.

The first time ipx meets a database that holds no catalogue, it takes the feeds and those
settings from config.toml, then rewrites config.toml without them, keeping the original beside it
as `config.toml.pre-database`. After that, feeds or those settings written into config.toml are
ignored, with a warning in the log saying so. The sections below describe them as they were
written in config.toml, which is still how a fresh install begins.

config.toml's default location is `$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/ipx/config.toml`
(`~/.config/ipx/config.toml`), overridden with `--config` or `$IPX_CONFIG`.

| What | Where | Override |
|---|---|---|
| Config | `~/.config/ipx/config.toml` | `--config`, `$IPX_CONFIG` |
| Database | `~/.local/share/ipx/state.db` | `$IPX_DATA_DIR` |
| Control socket | `$XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/ipx.sock` | `[general] socket` |
| Downloads | `[general] download_dir` | — |

`~` is expanded in paths. The database is SQLite in WAL mode unless `IPX_DATABASE_URL` names a
Postgres database instead. Back SQLite up by copying `state.db` while the daemon is stopped, or
with `sqlite3 state.db .backup`; back Postgres up with `pg_dump`.

ipx does not wait for the disk to confirm each write: SQLite syncs at checkpoints
(`synchronous=NORMAL`), and ipx's own Postgres sessions set `synchronous_commit=off`, which leaves
other databases on the server as they are. Waiting made a scan take most of a second a feed. A
crash of ipx loses nothing; a power cut, or a crash of the Postgres server, can lose the last moment
of changes, a read mark or a saved position, and never corrupts the database.

## `[general]`

```toml
[general]
download_dir      = "~/Podcasts"
socket            = "/run/user/1000/ipx.sock"
schedule          = "every 1h"      # "every 30m", "every 4h", "2d", "90" (minutes)
organize          = "feed"          # "feed" | "date"
max_total_gb      = 50              # 0 = unlimited
max_age_days      = 30              # 0 = keep forever
max_new_per_check = 3               # per feed, per scan. 0 = unlimited
media_types       = ["audio", "video"]
art_cache_mb      = 500             # artwork kept on disk. 0 = none
```

`schedule`, `max_total_gb`, `max_age_days`, `max_new_per_check`, `media_types` and `art_cache_mb` move into the
database as described above; `download_dir`, `socket` and `organize` stay in config.toml.

* **`schedule`** — how often feeds are re-checked. A feed's own `<ttl>` still wins when it asks to
  be polled *less* often, and a per-feed `schedule` overrides both. Without a schedule of its own,
  a feed that sends the same body check after check (Patreon, Substack, which ignore "not
  modified") is checked less often the longer it stays the same, up to every four hours, and is
  back on schedule once it changes. A feed that keeps failing
  waits as long as it has been failing before the next try, up to a day, and is back on schedule
  after its first success. A moment's failure to look its host up does not count: the network, not
  the feed, failed, and it is tried again in ten minutes. Admin-only from the UI.
* **`organize`** — `feed` files downloads under the feed's folder; `date` under `YYYY-MM-DD`.
* **`max_total_gb`** — the reaper deletes to get back under this, oldest first, keeping a 50 MB
  pad. Kept items are never deleted, and a file only counts as read once every subscriber has
  read it. `0` disables it entirely.
* **`max_age_days`** — items older than this with no file on disk are pruned from the database.
  Kept ones stay. `0` disables it.
* **`art_cache_mb`** — how much show and episode artwork iPX keeps on disk, in `art/` beside the
  database, so the page loads it from iPX rather than from every publisher's server. Over this,
  what has gone longest unshown goes first. `0` keeps none: artwork still comes through iPX, fetched
  each time. 500 by default.
* **`max_new_per_check`** — how many of a feed's newest episodes are downloaded; older ones stay
  listed to download by hand. It stops a new subscription pulling a whole back catalogue.
  `0` means every episode, for an archive; set it on the feeds you want archived, since on the
  global default it applies to every feed: subscribing to an OPML of 80 feeds with no limit
  fetched 216 files and 22 GB in one scan.
* **`media_types`** — top-level MIME types taken automatically. Anything else is still listed and
  can be fetched by hand; blog feeds put each article's header image in an `<enclosure>`, and
  without this the disk fills with artwork. Empty takes everything.

## `[torrent]`

```toml
[torrent]
enabled        = true
seed_ratio     = 1.0      # stop seeding at this ratio ...
seed_time_mins = 60       # ... or after this long, whichever comes first
port_range     = "6881-6889"
stall_mins     = 30       # give up on a torrent making no progress
```

A `.torrent` body is handed to the torrent path whatever MIME type it was advertised as. Torrents
run on their own tasks (two at a time) so a slow swarm never blocks a scan.

## `[web]`

```toml
[web]
enabled           = true
bind              = "0.0.0.0:8099"        # 127.0.0.1:8080 by default
token             = ""                    # generated and saved on first run
trusted_header    = ""                    # e.g. "Cf-Access-Authenticated-User-Email"
trusted_proxies   = ["127.0.0.1", "::1"]
access_team       = ""                    # e.g. "<team>.cloudflareaccess.com"
access_aud        = ""                    # the Access application's AUD tag
auto_create_users = true
sign_out_url      = ""                    # e.g. "/cdn-cgi/access/logout"
session_days      = 30
metrics_bind      = ""                    # e.g. "0.0.0.0:9187"; empty serves no metrics
```

* **`token`** — the shared secret, which signs in as the **admin**. `?token=…` sets a cookie, so
  you paste it once per browser. It is what the Docker healthcheck and any scripts use.
* **`trusted_header`** — a header naming the signed-in user, set by whatever fronts ipx. Empty
  disables that path. See [sso.md](sso.md).
* **`trusted_proxies`** — addresses allowed to assert that header, and the entire security boundary
  for it. Name the proxy, never a subnet.
* **`access_team`**, **`access_aud`** — with both set, a request through the proxy also has to
  carry the `Cf-Access-Jwt-Assertion` Cloudflare Access signed for this application, and the name
  comes from that token instead of the header. See [sso.md](sso.md#verifying-cloudflares-token).
* **`auto_create_users`** — create an account the first time the proxy vouches for a new name.
* **`sign_out_url`** — where Sign out sends someone the proxy signed in: the proxy's own sign-out,
  `/cdn-cgi/access/logout` behind Cloudflare Access. Empty sends them to the sign-in page, where
  the proxy signs them straight back in.
* **`session_days`** — sign a session out after this long without a request.
* **`metrics_bind`** — where to serve `/metrics` for Prometheus: database connections in use, the
  worker's queue, the runtime's tasks, memory and open files. It has a thread and a port of its own
  and no sign-in, so publish it to the LAN only. Empty, the default, serves none.

It is plain HTTP. On a LAN bind everything crosses the network in the clear — and a feed URL can
itself carry a credential. Put TLS in front of it if that matters.

## `[feeds.<id>]`

Kept in the database once ipx has moved them in: a feed's settings are changed in the web UI, and
feeds come and go with `ipx add`, `ipx rm` and `ipx import`. The table key is the feed id: stable,
human-readable, and used in paths and the API. `ipx add` derives it from the feed title.

```toml
[feeds.atp]
url                = "https://atp.fm/rss"
folder             = "Accidental Tech Podcast"   # default: the feed title
schedule           = "every 6h"                  # overrides [general] for this feed
media_types        = ["audio"]                   # overrides [general] for this feed
category           = "Technology"                # the Directory's, if the feed names none
listed             = true                        # shared with the directory with no subscribers
username           = "ray"                       # HTTP basic auth
password_env       = "IPX_ATP_PASS"              # preferred over a literal `password`
```

With more than one account, **`keywords`, `auto_download`, `allow_explicit` and
`max_new_per_check` live on each person's subscription in the database**, not here — the values in
config.toml are the fallback for a feed nobody has claimed. The keys above describe the feed itself
and are the same for everyone. See [users.md](users.md).

**The Directory** is the directory service's ([directory.md](directory.md)), which an admin sets
up in Admin, Directory: its address, this server's token and whether to share. They are server
settings, kept in the database (`directory_url`, `directory_token`, `directory_share`), not here.
With sharing on, this server sends it every feed in the catalogue that is not private, with how
many people here subscribe, and the `category` above for a feed that names none. To offer one with
nobody subscribed, `ipx add --list --category News <url>`: it subscribes no one, and a listed feed
stays in the catalogue, and so in what is shared, when its last subscriber leaves, where another
is dropped. A feed nobody
subscribes to is checked once a day. One that is dead (failing for 30 days) or quiet (nothing
new in a year), with nobody subscribed and no file on disk, is removed from the catalogue.

Feeds derived from a subscribed OPML are **not** in the catalogue: the OPML is the source of truth
and they are re-derived on every scan. Editing one in the UI promotes it to a catalogue entry.

## Environment

| Variable | Effect |
|---|---|
| `IPX_CONFIG` | Config file path |
| `IPX_DATA_DIR` | Directory holding `state.db` |
| `IPX_DATABASE_URL` | A `postgres://user:password@host:port/database` URL: use that database instead of `state.db` |
| `IPX_TEST_DATABASE_URL` | For `cargo test`: run the database tests on this Postgres database too, each in a schema of its own |
| `IPX_LOG` | What reaches stderr (`ipx=debug`, `ipx::scan=debug`, …) |
| `IPX_LOG_FORMAT` | `json` for one JSON object a line, with each request's and event's fields as its own (for Loki and the like); text otherwise |
| `IPX_UI_LOG` | What the in-process log buffer captures for the UI's Log view |
| `OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT` | An OTLP/HTTP collector, such as Tempo at `http://host:4318`: the daemon sends it traces of scans, downloads and web requests. The other `OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_*` variables apply too |
| `http_proxy` / `https_proxy` | Honoured for feed and enclosure fetches |

## ipx-web

The page's container reads only its environment (`web/Caddyfile`):

| Variable | Effect |
|---|---|
| `IPX_UPSTREAM` | Where ipx is, `host:port`; `ipx:8099` by default |
| `WEB_BIND` | Where to listen; `:8080` by default |
| `WEB_ROOT` | The built page; `/srv` in the image |
| `TUNNEL_PEER` | The one address whose `Cf-Access-*` headers are passed on to ipx: where cloudflared's requests come from. Unset passes none. See [sso.md](sso.md) |
| `WEB_TRACING` | `on` sends a span for each request to the collector the `OTEL_*` variables name (`OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT`, `OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_PROTOCOL=http/protobuf`, `OTEL_SERVICE_NAME`), continuing the page's trace into ipx. Off by default |

ipx-directory's settings are in [directory.md](directory.md).