Simple Chat Server with ETS

This is a simple chat server built in Elixir that uses TCP connections to allow clients to create, join, leave chat rooms, and exchange messages. The server is built using GenServer to manage room state and uses an ETS table to store each client's current room and player ID.

Features

• List Rooms: View all available chat rooms.
• Create Room: Create a new chat room.
• Join Room: Join a chat room (binds the client to that room).
• Send Message: Send messages to the current room without having to specify the room name each time.
• Leave Room: Leave the current chat room.
• View Room Players: List players in a specific room.
• Help: Display available commands.

Requirements

• Elixir (version 1.12 or later recommended)
• Erlang/OTP

Getting Started

Clone and Compile

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/zardamhussain/terminal_chat.git
   cd terminal_chat

2. Compile and Run the project:

   elixirc lib/room.ex start.exs

Running the Server

The server will listen on TCP port 8080.

Usage

You can use any TCP client (such as telnet or nc) to connect to the server. For example, using telnet:

telnet localhost 8080

Once connected, you can issue the following commands:

• rooms
  Lists all available chat rooms.

  rooms
  

• create
  Creates a new chat room.

  create general
  

• join
  Joins an existing room and binds the client’s state.
  (After joining, you no longer need to specify the room with every message.)

  join general
  

• msg
  Sends a message to the currently joined room.

  msg Hello everyone!
  

• leave
  Leaves the current room and clears the client’s state.

  leave
  

• room_players
  Lists all players in the specified room.

  room_players general
  

• help
  Displays a list of available commands.

  help
  

Example Session

rooms
create general
join general
msg Hello everyone!
room_players general
leave

Project Structure

• lib/room_server.ex:
  Contains the TCP server implementation, command parsing logic, and ETS-based state management.

• lib/room.ex:
  Contains the GenServer logic for managing chat rooms and broadcasting messages.

ETS State Management

An ETS table named :client_state is created at server startup to track each connected client’s state (their current room and player ID). When a client issues the "join" command, their state is stored in ETS; when they send a "msg" command or "leave", the ETS table is consulted and updated accordingly.