laravel-webrtc/rust/README.md

blax_webrtc — Rust media core

The timing-critical WebRTC media path for blax-software/laravel-webrtc, so that PHP never runs per-20ms real-time DSP.

Why Rust here

Handling connections concurrently in PHP is a solved problem (Swoole, FrankenPHP, ReactPHP). What is not proven is sustained per-packet media DSP (decrypt SRTP + Opus + RTP jitter every 20ms) glitch-free in single-threaded PHP. That work belongs in a language built for it. str0m is sans-IO (no threads or async of its own — you feed it bytes), which makes it ideal to embed and drive from PHP.

• str0m owns ICE / DTLS / SRTP / RTP / Opus.
• ext-php-rs exposes a thin function surface to PHP.
• PHP (Str0mMediaEngine) forwards SDP/ICE/control across the FFI boundary and calls back into Laravel for persistence (recordings, transmission rows).

Build

# one-time: cargo + the ext-php-rs helper
cargo install cargo-php

cd rust
cargo php install --release   # compiles the cdylib, installs it as the `blax_webrtc` extension
php -m | grep blax_webrtc      # verify it loaded

Then set WEBRTC_MEDIA_ENGINE=BlaxSoftware\LaravelWebRtc\Media\Str0mMediaEngine.

Status

Scaffold. src/lib.rs documents the intended FFI functions (blax_webrtc_offer, ..._add_ice_candidate, ..._start_recording, ..._connect_peers, ..._bridge, ..._close) that Str0mMediaEngine forwards to. Implement them against str0m's RTP/Frame API, then flip the PHP engine off NullMediaEngine.