[libp2p](https://github.com/libp2p/specs) is a networking stack and library modularized out of [The IPFS Project](https://github.com/ipfs/ipfs), and bundled separately for other tools to use.
libp2p is the product of a long, and arduous quest of understanding -- a deep dive into the internet's network stack, and plentiful peer-to-peer protocols from the past. Building large-scale peer-to-peer systems has been complex and difficult in the last 15 years, and libp2p is a way to fix that. It is a "network stack" -- a protocol suite -- that cleanly separates concerns, and enables sophisticated applications to only use the protocols they absolutely need, without giving up interoperability and upgradeability. libp2p grew out of IPFS, but it is built so that lots of people can use it, for lots of different projects.
While developing, you may need to make changes to several modules at once, or you may want changes made locally in one module to be available for import by another.
Using the tooling in the workspace repository, you can checkout all of go-libp2p's module repos and enter "local mode", which adds [replace directives](https://github.com/golang/go/wiki/Modules#gomod) to the go.mod files in each local working copy. When you build locally, the libp2p depdendencies will be resolved from your local working copies.
Once you've committed your changes, you can switch back to "remote mode", which removes the replace directives and pulls imports from the main go module cache.
Before adopting gomod, libp2p used [gx](https://github.com/whyrusleeping/gx) to manage dependencies using [IPFS](https://ipfs.io).
Due to the difficulties in keeping both dependency management solutions up-to-date, gx support was ended in April 2019.
Ending gx support does not mean that existing gx builds will break. Because gx references dependencies by their immutable IPFS hash, any currently working gx builds will continue to work for as long as the dependencies are resolvable in IPFS.
However, new changes to go-libp2p will not be published via gx, and users are encouraged to adopt gomod to stay up-to-date.
If you experience any issues migrating from gx to gomod, please [join the discussion at the libp2p forums](https://discuss.libp2p.io/t/gomod-and-go-libp2p/44).
> This table is generated using the module [`package-table`](https://github.com/ipfs-shipyard/package-table) with `package-table --data=package-list.json`.
| [`go-libp2p-transport-upgrader`](//github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-transport-upgrader) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-transport-upgrader) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-libp2p-transport-upgrader) | upgrades multiaddr-net connections into full libp2p transports |
| [`go-libp2p-reuseport-transport`](//github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-reuseport-transport) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-reuseport-transport) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-libp2p-reuseport-transport) | partial transport for building transports that reuse ports |
| [`go-libp2p-record`](//github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-record) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-record) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-libp2p-record) | record type and validator logic |
| [`go-buffer-pool`](//github.com/libp2p/go-buffer-pool) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-buffer-pool) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-buffer-pool) | a variable size buffer pool for go |
| [`go-libp2p-gostream`](//github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-gostream) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-gostream) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-libp2p-gostream) | Go 'net' wrappers for libp2p |
| [`go-libp2p-http`](//github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-http) | [](https://travis-ci.com/libp2p/go-libp2p-http) | [](https://codecov.io/gh/libp2p/go-libp2p-http) | HTTP on top of libp2p streams |
go-libp2p is part of [The IPFS Project](https://github.com/ipfs/ipfs), and is MIT-licensed open source software. We welcome contributions big and small! Take a look at the [community contributing notes](https://github.com/ipfs/community/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md). Please make sure to check the [issues](https://github.com/ipfs/go-libp2p/issues). Search the closed ones before reporting things, and help us with the open ones.
- ask questions or talk about things in our [discussion forums](https://discuss.libp2p.io), or open an [issue](https://github.com/libp2p/go-libp2p/issues) for bug reports, or #libp2p on freenode.
There's a few things you can do right now to help out:
- Go through the modules below and **check out existing issues**. This would be especially useful for modules in active development. Some knowledge of IPFS/libp2p may be required, as well as the infrasture behind it - for instance, you may need to read up on p2p and more complex operations like muxing to be able to help technically.
