Chat Switchboard

A self-hosted AI chat application for enterprise and government environments. Unified interface for multiple AI providers with admin controls, team management, and security features.

Quick Start

# Clone and start
git clone <repo-url> && cd chat-switchboard
docker compose up -d

# Access at http://localhost:3000
# Default admin: admin / admin

Features

• Multi-Provider: Anthropic, OpenAI, OpenRouter, Venice AI — with BYOK support
• Team Management: Roles (admin/user) for vertical permissions, Teams for horizontal visibility
• Personas: Preset configurations (model + system prompt + parameters) at global, team, or personal scope
• Model Catalog: Three-state visibility (enabled/disabled/team-only) with admin controls
• Message Trees: Edit and regenerate with full conversation forking — navigate sibling branches
• Notes: Markdown notes with full-text search, folders, and tags
• Extensions: Browser extension system with custom renderers, tool bridge, and self-contained styling
  • Built-in: Mermaid diagrams, KaTeX math, CSV tables, diff viewer, JS sandbox, regex tester
• Server Tools: Calculator and datetime tools (auto-registered, zero config)
• Audit Log: All admin operations logged with actor, action, and resource details
• Security: JWT + refresh tokens, AES-256-GCM API key encryption, optional mTLS, optional OIDC/Keycloak, environment classification banners
• Airgapped: Local vendor files (marked.js, DOMPurify, KaTeX, mermaid.js), no CDN required
• Mobile: Responsive design, PWA manifest
• Real-time: WebSocket event bus for tool bridge, live updates

Architecture

┌─────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────────────┐
│   Browser    │────▶│ nginx (port 80)              │
│  (vanilla JS)│◀────│  ├─ /api/* → Go backend:8080 │
└─────────────┘     │  ├─ /ws   → WebSocket proxy  │
                    │  └─ /*    → static files      │
                    └──────────────────────────────┘
                              │
                    ┌─────────▼─────────┐
                    │  Go Backend        │
                    │  ├─ handlers/      │
                    │  ├─ store/postgres/ │
                    │  ├─ providers/     │
                    │  └─ capabilities/  │
                    └─────────┬─────────┘
                              │
                    ┌─────────▼─────────┐
                    │   PostgreSQL 16    │
                    └───────────────────┘

Go backend (vanilla, no framework beyond Gin) with a store layer abstracting all database access. Providers package handles LLM API calls. Capabilities package resolves model features from catalog data, known model tables, and heuristic inference. Server tools (calculator, datetime) auto-register via init(). EventBus + WebSocket hub routes tool calls between backend and browser extensions.

Frontend is vanilla JavaScript — no build step, no bundler. 15 files organized by domain: api.js (HTTP client), app.js (state + init), chat.js (send, regen, edit, branch), events.js (event bus + WebSocket), extensions.js (loader, registry, renderer pipeline, tool bridge), ui-core.js (DOM rendering + streaming), ui-format.js (markdown, code blocks), ui-primitives.js (shared components), ui-settings.js / ui-admin.js (settings and admin panels), notes.js, tokens.js, debug.js, settings-handlers.js, admin-handlers.js.

Configuration

All configuration via environment variables. See server/.env.example for the full list.

Variable	Default	Description
PORT	8080	Backend listen port
BASE_PATH		URL prefix (e.g. /chat)
DB_HOST	localhost	PostgreSQL host
DB_NAME	chat_switchboard	Database name
JWT_SECRET	(required)	Token signing key
SWITCHBOARD_ADMIN_USERNAME		Bootstrap admin username
SWITCHBOARD_ADMIN_PASSWORD		Bootstrap admin password
ENCRYPTION_KEY		AES key for API key encryption (required if encrypted keys exist)
SEED_USERS		Dev/test only: user:pass:role,user2:pass2:role2
STORAGE_BACKEND	(auto)	pvc or s3. Auto-detects PVC if not set.
STORAGE_PATH	/data/storage	PVC mount point (also scratch dir for S3 extraction)
S3_ENDPOINT		S3 endpoint (e.g. http://minio:9000, required for S3)
S3_BUCKET		S3 bucket name (must exist, required for S3)
S3_ACCESS_KEY		S3 access key ID
S3_SECRET_KEY		S3 secret access key
S3_REGION	us-east-1	S3 region
S3_PREFIX		Optional key prefix within bucket
S3_FORCE_PATH_STYLE	true	Path-style URLs (required for MinIO, Ceph)

Deployment

Three Docker images support different scenarios:

Image	Dockerfile	Use Case
Unified	Dockerfile	Dev, docker-compose, single-node
Backend	server/Dockerfile	K8s — scale API pods independently
Frontend	Dockerfile.frontend	K8s — scale FE pods independently

Docker Compose (development — unified image)

docker compose up -d              # start all services
docker compose up -d --build      # rebuild after code changes
docker compose --profile dev up   # include Adminer DB UI

Kubernetes (split images)

Build and push both images:

docker build -f server/Dockerfile -t your-registry/switchboard-api:0.11.0 server/
docker build -f Dockerfile.frontend -t your-registry/switchboard-fe:0.11.0 .

Backend deployment:

containers:
  - name: api
    image: your-registry/switchboard-api:0.11.0
    ports:
      - containerPort: 8080
    env:
      - name: DB_HOST
        value: "postgres-service"
      - name: BASE_PATH
        value: "/chat"      # must match ingress path
      - name: JWT_SECRET
        valueFrom:
          secretKeyRef:
            name: switchboard-secrets
            key: jwt-secret

Frontend deployment:

containers:
  - name: frontend
    image: your-registry/switchboard-fe:0.11.0
    ports:
      - containerPort: 80
    env:
      - name: BASE_PATH
        value: "/chat"      # injected into index.html at startup
    volumeMounts:
      - name: branding
        mountPath: /branding
        readOnly: true       # optional: custom logo, colors

Ingress routes /api/* and /ws to the backend Service, everything else to the frontend Service. The frontend entrypoint generates the nginx config dynamically based on BASE_PATH.

Path-Based Routing

Set BASE_PATH=/chat to serve the application under a subpath. The frontend reads window.__BASE__ injected at container startup, and all API calls are prefixed automatically.

Airgapped / Disconnected

The Docker build bakes in marked.js, DOMPurify, and KaTeX (JS + CSS + fonts) from npm during the vendor stage. Mermaid.js loads dynamically from local vendor with CDN fallback. No CDN calls at runtime in airgapped deployments. The src/vendor/ directory contains local copies as fallback for development without Docker.

Database

PostgreSQL 16+ required. The pgcrypto extension is used for gen_random_uuid().

Schema Management

The Go backend auto-migrates on startup using files in server/database/migrations/. For manual operations:

# Bootstrap database (superuser, creates role + DB)
scripts/db-bootstrap.sh

# Manual migration (usually not needed)
scripts/db-migrate.sh

# Validate schema
scripts/db-validate.sh

Key Tables (v0.11)

Table	Purpose
users	Accounts with role, avatar, settings, encrypted vault (UEK)
provider_configs	API provider configurations (scope: global/team/personal)
model_catalog	Synced model list with capabilities, visibility, and type
personas	Model presets (scope: global/team/personal)
channels	Conversations with type (direct/group/channel)
messages	Message tree with parent_id for forking, tool_calls JSONB
teams / team_members	Organizational units
notes	Markdown notes with full-text search
extensions / extension_user_settings	Browser extension registry and per-user config
usage_log / model_pricing	Token usage tracking and cost calculation
audit_log	Admin action audit trail
user_model_settings	Per-user model visibility and sort preferences

API

All endpoints under /api/v1/. Authentication via Authorization: Bearer <token> header.

Auth

• POST /auth/register — Register (if allow_registration policy is true)
• POST /auth/login — Login, returns access + refresh tokens
• POST /auth/refresh — Refresh access token
• POST /auth/logout — Revoke refresh token

Channels & Messages

• GET/POST /channels — List/create conversations
• GET/PUT/DELETE /channels/:id — Channel CRUD
• GET/POST /channels/:id/messages — Message list/create
• POST /chat/completions — Stream AI completions (SSE)
• POST /channels/:id/messages/:msgId/edit — Edit and fork
• POST /channels/:id/messages/:msgId/regenerate — Regenerate response

Models

• GET /models/enabled — Models available to the user (global + team + personal)
• GET/PUT /models/preferences — User model visibility settings

Personal Providers (BYOK)

• GET/POST /api-configs — User's personal provider configs
• GET/PUT/DELETE /api-configs/:id — Provider CRUD
• POST /api-configs/:id/models/fetch — Refresh models from provider API
• GET /api-configs/:id/models — List models for a personal provider

Teams

• GET /teams — Teams the user belongs to
• GET/POST /teams/:id/providers — Team provider management (team admins)
• GET/POST /teams/:id/presets — Team preset management (team admins)

Admin

• GET/POST /admin/users — User management
• GET/PUT /admin/settings/:key — Global settings and policies
• GET/POST /admin/configs — Global provider configs
• GET/POST /admin/models/fetch — Model catalog sync
• GET/PUT /admin/roles/:role — Model role configuration
• GET /admin/usage — Usage dashboard
• GET /admin/audit — Audit log
• GET/POST/PUT/DELETE /admin/extensions — Extension management

Extensions

• GET /extensions?tier=browser — List enabled browser extensions
• GET /extensions/:id/assets/*path — Serve extension assets (public, no auth)

WebSocket

• GET /ws?token=<jwt> — EventBus WebSocket for real-time events and tool bridge

Development

# Backend (requires Go 1.22+)
cd server
cp .env.example .env   # edit with your DB credentials
go run .

# Frontend (just serve static files)
# Use any HTTP server pointed at src/
python3 -m http.server 3000 --directory src

License

Proprietary. All rights reserved.