No I'm not talking about the UI toolkit, I mean how do you start an application using a distributed database that runs in the browser? In the last post I mentioned relying on a host account, which can be queried in Gun via it's public key. One of my first additions to RSStream was a /host-public-key endpoint. I wanted to be able to start from just the static build files and have the startup process take care of itself, so the first thing the browser does on load is check if it has the host account's public key in local storage, otherwise it will fetch it.
 

if (!pub) {
  fetch(`${window.location.origin}/host-public-key`)
    .then(res => res.text())
    .then(key => setPub(key))
  return
}

setHost(gun.user(pub))
localStorage.setItem("pub", pub)

Once it has this, it knows how to find all the data associated with the account. The next step to a useful piece of software is user accounts. Since Gun is distributed, it's possible for anyone to create an account. This is because it's all done in the browser, there's no server required to verify your credentials. But this is not overly useful if users can't discover each other, or if you want some sort of control over the sign up process. RSStream deals with this by using invite codes. The sign up process requires a code, which is stored alongside your public key in the host account's data after your user account is created in Gun.

// The server logs into the host user account on start up:
const user = gun.user()
user.auth(alias, pass, auth)

app.post("/claim-invite-code", async (req, res) => {
  const data = {
    pub: req.body.pub,
    alias: req.body.alias,
    name: req.body.alias,
  }
  user.get("accounts").get(code).put(data)
})

So the invite code starts as a sign up requirement and becomes a reference to your account in the host's data. The sign up form allows you to choose a username and password like it's a normal process, but as you will see, the code you're given becomes the main reference point for your account. From here on, once an account has been created from an invite code I will refer to this value as the account code.