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I'm not aware of any entirely decentralised system which would allow two computers which are behind NAT to find and then talk to each other. Or any obvious desi
by xj9 9y ago
I'm not aware of any entirely decentralised system which would allow two computers which are behind NAT to find and then talk to each other. Or any obvious design which would work there.
then you're clearly not the person we should be asking to build this kind of thing are you? :-)
my proposal actually solves two important problems with peer-to-peer systems, and I barely have to write any new code to make it work! the solution? i2p! it's an anonymous mix network, much like Tor, but completely decentralized. using an intermediary dex mix network fixes the nat issue and prevents you from leaking your IP address to other peers.
https://geti2p.net/en/comparison/tor https://geti2p.net/en/comparison/tor
- AndrewDucker 9y agoAssume I'm at my computer with i2p installed. How do I find your computer? (Serious question - I've not used it myself, and I'm intrigued at the process.)
- xj9 9y agohttps://geti2p.net/en/about/intro https://geti2p.net/en/about/intro endpoints are identified by their public key hash. each endpoint maintains a set of anonymized routes. this routing information is stored in a Distributed Hash Table (DHT). if you want to connect to another endpoint, you lookup the route for the public key hash, build an outbound route, and you're good. more concretely, an ipfs transfer would work by using public key hashes in place of IP addresses to identify peers and a known set of endpoint keys for bootstrapping.
- AndrewDucker 9y agoSo all you need is the hash (sent to you by your friend over IM or email or postcard) and you're good to go? I like it. Now, is it available today in a form (as the OP put it) which "A person whose computer knowledge extends to using facebook" can use?
- xj9 9y agoif they have the ability to install software, they can use i2p https://geti2p.net/en/download https://geti2p.net/en/download
- AndrewDucker 9y agoOdd. I looked at the description on the main page, and it lists eDonkey, BitTorrent, and Gnutella, but not any kind of direct file transfer. Am I missing something?
- xj9 9y agoyes. 1. click bit torrent 2. click create torrent 3. type the path to your file 4. share magnet link magnet:?xt=urn:btih:d0da0a2cac2bb3fd7ba6548edef12a24122ef481&tr=http://diftracker.i2p/announce.php http://diftracker.i2p/announce.php
- icebraining 9y agoDoes the magnet link work without DifTracker? Because that's still a centralized system.
- xj9 9y agoyes, the tracker is optional. the built in torrent client supports BEP 5. http://www.bittorrent.org/beps/bep_0005.html http://www.bittorrent.org/beps/bep_0005.html