Configuration Reference

This document describes the TOML configuration file format used by Language Pipes (LpConfig). See the CLI Reference for how -c/--config resolves a configuration file and how it is used by run, config, and the TUI.

A small set of machine-local settings are controlled by environment variables instead of the TOML file. See Environment Variables below.

---

Minimal Configuration

node_id = "my-node"
network_ip = "[Your local IP address]"
job_port = 8000
end_models = ["Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"]

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"
device = "cpu"
memory = 4

Key ordering matters. In TOML, key/value pairs that appear after an array-of-tables header ([[layer_models]], [[bootstrap_nodes]]) belong to that table, not to the top-level document. Put all top-level scalar keys (node_id, job_port, end_models, etc.) before any [[layer_models]] or [[bootstrap_nodes]] blocks.

Complete Example

# === Required ===
node_id = "node-1"

# === End Models ===
end_models = ["meta-llama/Llama-3.2-1B-Instruct"]

# === API Server ===
job_port = 8000
api_keys = ["test_key"]

# === Network ===
peer_port = 5000
network_ip = "192.168.0.1"
network_key = "9f86d081884c7d659a2feaa0c55ad015"
whitelist_ips = []
whitelist_node_ids = []

# === Layer Models ===
[[layer_models]]
model_id = "meta-llama/Llama-3.2-1B-Instruct"
device = "cpu"
memory = 5

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"
device = "cuda:0"
memory = 8

# === Bootstrap Nodes ===
[[bootstrap_nodes]]
address = "192.168.0.2"
port = 5000

---

Properties

Required

node_id

Unique identifier for this node on the network.

Type	Required	Default
string	✓	—

node_id = "my-node-1"

layer_models

Array of models to host. Each model is defined as a TOML table.

Type	Default
array of tables	[] (empty)

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"
device = "cpu"
memory = 4

Each entry has the following fields:

Field	Type	Required	Description
model_id	string	✓	HuggingFace model ID or path in /models directory
device	string	✓	PyTorch device: cpu, cuda:0, cuda:1, etc.
memory	number	✓	Maximum memory allocation in GB

Multiple models:

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"
device = "cpu"
memory = 4

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "meta-llama/Llama-3.2-1B-Instruct"
device = "cuda:0"
memory = 8

end_models

Array of model IDs for which to load the End Model (embedding layer + output head). The node with a model in its end_models list is the only node that can see your actual prompts and responses for that model. Other nodes only process hidden state tensors and cannot read the conversation content.

Type	Default
array of strings	[] (empty)

end_models = ["Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"]

Privacy-preserving setup:

end_models = ["Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"]  # Your prompts stay on this machine

[[layer_models]]
model_id = "Qwen/Qwen3-1.7B"
device = "cpu"
memory = 2

---

API Server

job_port

Port for the OpenAI-compatible API. Omit to disable the API server.

Type	Default
int	None (disabled)

job_port = 8000

api_keys

List of accepted API keys for the OpenAI-compatible server.

Type	Default
array of strings	None (disabled)

api_keys = ["test_key"]

---

Network

These options configure the peer-to-peer network. See Distributed State Network for details.

peer_port

Port for peer-to-peer communication.

Type	Default
int	5000

peer_port = 5000

network_ip

IP address that this node advertises to other peers. Only necessary for bootstrap configurations where other nodes connect to this node. If not specified, the node attempts to auto-detect its network IP.

Type	Default
string	None (auto-detect)

network_ip = "192.168.1.100"

bootstrap_nodes

Array of peer nodes to contact when joining the network. Leave empty for a standalone or first node.

Type	Default
array of tables	[] (empty)

Each entry has the following fields:

Field	Type	Required	Description
address	string	✓	IP address of the bootstrap node
port	int	✓	Port of the bootstrap node

[[bootstrap_nodes]]
address = "192.168.1.100"
port = 5000

network_key

Hex-encoded AES-128 key used to encrypt peer-to-peer traffic. If null or omitted, peer communication is unencrypted.

Type	Default
string (32 hex characters)	null

network_key = "9f86d081884c7d659a2feaa0c55ad015"

Generate a key with:

language-pipes keygen

This prints a hex key (and writes the same value to network.key). Copy that hex string into network_key, or generate one directly from the network configuration screen in the TUI.

whitelist_ips

IP addresses this node will allow for peer communication. If configured, the node only accepts inbound DSN requests from these IPs and only sends outbound requests to these IPs.

Type	Default
array of strings	[] (allow all)

whitelist_ips = ["192.168.1.100", "192.168.1.101"]

whitelist_node_ids

Peer node IDs this node will allow for communication. If configured, the node only accepts inbound DSN messages from these node IDs and only sends outbound messages to these node IDs.

Type	Default
array of strings	[] (allow all)

whitelist_node_ids = ["bootstrap-node", "trusted-worker-1"]

---

Environment Variables

These configure machine-local paths and runtime behavior. They are read directly from the process environment and are independent of the TOML configuration file described above.

LP_APP_DIR

Application configuration directory. Stores configs and credentials.

Default
~/.config/language_pipes

export LP_APP_DIR=~/.config/language_pipes

Directory structure:

app_dir/
├── configs/     # Configuration files
└── credentials/ # Credential files

LP_MODEL_DIR

Model cache directory. Stores downloaded model weights.

Default
~/.cache/language_pipes/models

export LP_MODEL_DIR=~/.cache/language_pipes/models

LP_NUM_LOCAL_LAYERS

Number of initial model layers an end model executes locally before forwarding work to other nodes. Higher values improve prompt obfuscation by keeping more of the early pipeline on your machine. All nodes hosting the same end model should use the same value so that model layers are loaded correctly.

Default
1

export LP_NUM_LOCAL_LAYERS=1

---

Hugging Face Authentication

hf_token

HuggingFace API token for downloading gated or private models (like Llama). This is stored separately from node configuration files, in <app_dir>/globals.toml. Language Pipes prompts for the token in the TUI when downloading a gated model and offers to save it for future downloads.

Get your token from https://huggingface.co/settings/tokens.

Note: For gated models (like Llama), you must also accept the model’s license agreement on the HuggingFace website before downloading.