Set up your machine

Plugging an app in needs Node.js 20 or later, Python 3 if you use the Python client, and curl. No Rust, no protobuf compiler, and no copy of the DSM repo: DSM's tools come prebuilt from a release, for Linux (x86-64 and ARM64) and macOS (Apple silicon and Intel). On Windows, use WSL2 with Ubuntu and follow the Ubuntu lines. PostgreSQL is not on the list either: you need it only if you later run storage nodes of your own.

1. Install the prerequisites

macOS, with Homebrew. macOS already has Python 3 with venv, and curl.

brew install node

Ubuntu or Debian. Ubuntu's own nodejs package is older than the Node.js 20 the tools need, so Node comes from NodeSource:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y curl ca-certificates python3-venv
curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_22.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install -y nodejs

These four lines are the ones the newcomer check (make first-run) runs on a clean Ubuntu before it follows this path to a payment received.

2. Install DSM's tools

Download the release's install script, then run it:

curl -fsSLO https://github.com/deterministicstatemachine/dsm/releases/download/v0.1.0-beta.4/install.sh
sh install.sh

It downloads the release's SHA256SUMS, then the app host built for your machine and the developer archive, and checks each against SHA256SUMS before it unpacks anything. A file that is missing from it or does not match stops the install, and nothing is changed. Then it installs into ~/.local:

• dsm-app-host: your app's own DSM account.
• dsm-app: your app's account from the terminal.
• dsm-dev-wallet: a player's wallet in the terminal, to test with no phone.
• dsm-connect-starter: the starter app, a page to build your app from.
• The TypeScript and Python clients, as packages you install into your app, under ~/.local/share/dsm/clients.

What it printed on a Mac:

DSM 0.1.0-beta.4 for macos-arm64, from …
  verified  dsm-app-host-0.1.0-beta.4-macos-arm64.tar.gz  sha256 bfaebcc172e33f0a519bd4e50d42968bb7d67cee2a73eed78712a62c9af4f3eb
  verified  dsm-developer-0.1.0-beta.4.tar.gz  sha256 7ecc867880f1c6feeb82d7b1f48d7c840a58bb6bcfb6593e26360a3afe2cf40e

installed:
  ~/.local/bin/dsm-app-host        dsm-app-host 0.1.0-beta.4
  ~/.local/bin/dsm-app
  ~/.local/bin/dsm-dev-wallet
  ~/.local/bin/dsm-connect-starter
  the clients, to install into your app:
    ~/.local/share/dsm/clients/dsm-app-client-0.1.0-beta.4.tgz
    ~/.local/share/dsm/clients/dsm_app_client-0.1.0b4-py3-none-any.whl
note: ~/.local/bin is not on your PATH; add it (and the same line to your shell's profile):
  export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

… is where it downloaded from, and the checksums are that build's; yours name the release's. To check the script itself before you run it, read it: it is short, and it is scripts/install.sh in the repo.

3. Put the tools on your PATH

If the install said ~/.local/bin is not on your PATH, add it to this terminal, and the same line to your shell's profile (~/.zshrc on macOS, ~/.bashrc on Ubuntu):

export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

Then check:

dsm-app-host --version

dsm-app-host 0.1.0-beta.4

4. A folder for your app

Your app's account lives in the folder you start it from, so start from your app's own folder. To follow this guide, make one:

mkdir my-app && cd my-app

Every command from here on runs in this folder.

Building from source instead

To work on DSM itself, build the wallet (next page), or run storage nodes of your own (A storage set of your own), clone the repo and build it. That needs a C toolchain, Git, protobuf's compiler and Rust as well; a JDK 17 is for the Android wallet.

git clone https://github.com/deterministicstatemachine/dsm.git
cd dsm
make doctor

QUICKSTART.md lists the prerequisites. make doctor reads every tool the build needs and says what it found; it changes nothing on your machine. From the repo, the make targets run the same programs as the installed commands, built from your checkout:

The repo's accounts live in its own .dsm-dev folder, so run those from the repo's root.

Next: The wallet on Android and iOS, or skip straight to your app's own DSM account.