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I'd say a Raspberry Pi 400 (or several) and a shoebox packed full of USB drives and other flash storage. I would also use read-only optical disks for redundant

I'd say a Raspberry Pi 400 (or several) and a shoebox packed full of USB drives and other flash storage. I would also use read-only optical disks for redundant copies (along with a couple of USB optical drives). I would also get a USB-powerable travel router. Basically, the massive prevalence of USB over the past couple decades is your friend. I would store local copies of the standard fare like Project Gutenberg, Wikipedia, instruction/repair manuals, and textbooks (especially math and science ones). For particularly important stuff, like survival guides, I'd even look at paper copies. Perhaps even laminate a few maps and navigational charts. I'd also try to have several copies of complete Linux package repositories or at least all of the packages that I know I'll need. If/when backbone infrastructure starts crumbling, it'll cascade. Even downloading a text-based browser could prove an impossible task. Even just having a hand radio could prove vital. Just be aware of how you might power it (and any audio equipment it might need).

croddin 5y ago
I think there needs to be a good "distribution" of all modern open software in a way that it could be developed offline. We can download Wikipedia and Project Guttenberg and have access to a huge amount of human knowledge, but there is no good similar archive for software. If I currently had a copy of popular repos on GitHub for example and needed to change and build some random important piece of software for helping rebuild society without the rest of internet, that would be hard for a lot of projects. You would probably need a copy of all of Linux package repos, npm, pypy, dockerhub etc to be able to edit any piece of software you might need to edit but then you would also have make changes in different places for things to work offline etc. I think things like content addressability, reproducible builds, nix, and ipfs are getting us closer. Hopefully soon we will be able to make a usable "dump" of all modern open source software and have it be able to just work for development.
lordnacho 5y ago
Imagine if people forgot to have a copy of stackoverflow.com in the apocalypse. I guess that is what would make it the apocalypse.

croddin 5y ago

I think there needs to be a good "distribution" of all modern open software in a way that it could be developed offline. We can download Wikipedia and Project Guttenberg and have access to a huge amount of human knowledge, but there is no good similar archive for software. If I currently had a copy of popular repos on GitHub for example and needed to change and build some random important piece of software for helping rebuild society without the rest of internet, that would be hard for a lot of projects. You would probably need a copy of all of Linux package repos, npm, pypy, dockerhub etc to be able to edit any piece of software you might need to edit but then you would also have make changes in different places for things to work offline etc. I think things like content addressability, reproducible builds, nix, and ipfs are getting us closer. Hopefully soon we will be able to make a usable "dump" of all modern open source software and have it be able to just work for development.

lordnacho 5y ago

Imagine if people forgot to have a copy of stackoverflow.com in the apocalypse. I guess that is what would make it the apocalypse.