Setting up Element Call (optional)

The playbook can install and configure Element Call for you.

Element Call is a native Matrix video conferencing application developed by Element, designed for secure, scalable, privacy-respecting, and decentralized video and voice calls over the Matrix protocol. Built on MatrixRTC (MSC4143), it utilizes MSC4195 with LiveKit as its backend.

See the project's documentation to learn more.

Warning

Because Element Call requires a few experimental features in the Matrix protocol, it's very likely that it only works with the Synapse homeserver.

Decide on a domain and path

By default, Element Call is configured to be served on the call.element.DOMAIN domain.

If you'd like to run Element Call on another hostname or path, use the matrix_element_call_hostname variable. A matrix_element_call_path_prefix variable is also available to set a path prefix for the Element Call service, but Element Call does not support running under a sub-path yet.

Adjusting DNS records

If you've changed the default hostname, you may need to adjust your DNS records accordingly to point to the correct server.

Ensure that the following DNS names have a public IP/FQDN:

call.element.example.com
livekit.example.com

Adjusting firewall rules

All services are exposed via HTTP/HTTPS as per usual, ports for which you've already opened as described in the prerequisites document.

In addition to that, you'll also need to open ports required by LiveKit Server as described in its own Adjusting firewall rules section.

Adjusting the playbook configuration

Add the following configuration to your inventory/host_vars/matrix.DOMAIN/vars.yml file:

matrix_element_call_enabled: true

💡 Enabling Element Call will automatically:

enable the LiveKit JWT Service and Livekit Server services
enable a few experimental features in Synapse that Element Call requires

Installing

After configuring the playbook and potentially adjusting your DNS records and adjusting firewall rules, run the installation command: just install-all or just setup-all

Usage

Once installed, Element Call integrates seamlessly with Matrix clients like Element Web.

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