Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Florent Daigniere]

On Thu, 2015-10-15 at 20:02 +0200, xor wrote:
> On Thursday, October 15, 2015 06:33:15 PM Florent Daigniere wrote:
> > Is "pretending that Opennet can work" still the official project's
> > line?
> 
> What is it you request here?

That we have a discussion about it. As for what the outcome should be,
I'm not sure.

If it was up to me Opennet wouldn't have existed...

I do not think that "our users" are genuinely interested in publishing
anything anymore. Back when the project started, there wasn't
Wikipedia, Blogger, facebook nor twitter... And those who are (the
copyright infringement brigade, ...) we're not ready/willing to
support.

I do not think that Freenet provides the security guarantees one would
require to face a "state level" adversary. I do think that implying
otherwise is deceitful (but I also acknowledge that it's what marketing
is about and that it's necessary to raise funds).

I'm not convinced that Darknet (as currently implemented) even works.

All in all, I think that we're still looking for our audience, a decade
and a half in the making... and that's only problematic because we have
chosen it to be.

I've always seen Freenet as an interesting (open) research problem and
a way to learn, nothing more.

Florent

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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Florent Daigniere]

On Thu, 2015-10-15 at 20:02 +0200, xor wrote:
> However, I think we've spent too much time upon core work while
> neglecting 
> deployment (Debian packages) and client applications; so this should
> only be 
> done if a volunteer steps up to do it, not something which we can do
> with the 
> limited funds we have.

Haha.

I am thinking exactly the opposite. Way too much time/effort/money has
been spent on the peripherial stuff. FRED would work much better if we
didn't focus so much effort on creating an eco-system around it.
Feature/scope creep is what kills us.

Have you seen my other thread? We've terrible code, including in what
can be considered the core of fred! We're still using the original DSA-
based crypto meant for the very first release of Freenet!

Have you seen your other thread? You're seriously advocating that we
should bundle our own browser!

It's way-past time to seriously think about where we're going and what
we're doing.

Florent

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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Florent Daigniere]

On Thu, 2015-10-15 at 15:02 -0500, Ian wrote:
> Regarding Java, I don't agree that we should adopt some other
> programming
> language because it's "cool" and Java isn't.  In fact "coolness" is
> perhaps
> the worst possible basis on which to select a programming language!
> 
> Java is still the world's most popular programming language, and
> while it
> somewhat stagnated under Sun, Oracle is making progress again, Java8
> is the
> most significant release since Java5.  I think Java is still the
> right bet
> for these reasons.


Just clarifying so that we're all on the same page: We've always
prioritized other things over paying our technical debt: Freenet is
mostly java 1.4 ... despite us setting the compat level to 1.6

We're very far from a java8 codebase

Florent

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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[salutarydiacritical23]

Step back and take a deep breath. I'm not telling you to shutdown your 
website and foundation and host your project on Tor' s site.


I'm questioning if the overhead of designing and maintaining yet another 
anonymity protocol makes sense given Freenet's current situation. You 
can concentrate on polishing Freenet UX and storage algorithms instead 
and leave the anonymity to Tor. Its an intensive process coming up with 
something that stands up against serious enemies. Tor gets most of the 
academic community's attention improving against attacks all the time. 
You get this for free by switching to their protocol for transport.


Not every developer that designed their app to communicate over Tor or a 
socks proxy, stuck their software with theirs. It's a more sensible 
decision than everyone rolling a custom anonymous protocol every time 
they wanted such services. Just like crypto, its better to go with a 
standard cipher checked the most by researchers than writing your own. 
Again I'm not criticizing your effort but your wiki page on attacks 
against Freenet does not inspire confidence in your target audience of 
investigate journalists and whistleblowers.




On 2015-10-15 23:57, Ian wrote:

Software isn't like playdough, you can't take two different software
projects and just stick them together, and expect the result to make 
sense

(even if the projects have related goals).

In terms of the benefits of an alliance with Tor I'm afraid you're 
being

naive.  From Tor's perspective, an "alliance" with Freenet would make
absolutely no sense.  They'd essentially just be diverting developers,
users, and funding away from their own project.  Don't get me wrong,
they're  nice guys, but it would simply be irrational.

Tor and Freenet might be related at a high-level, but this whole idea 
that
separate software projects should all be glued together into one huge 
mass

of bloatware is very misguided.  It's the polar opposite of the Unix
philosophy .  I wish 
people

would stop suggesting it.  It wouldn't solve any problem and would be a
massive waste of time and resources.

Ian.



On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 4:35 PM, 


wrote:

I am a Freenet user and want you to succeed so look at my words from 
that

angle.

You are missing out on an obvious natural alliance with Tor that can 
bring

in many benefits from funding, users, publicity and manpower. The Tor
project also invested a lot in private client side applications like 
the
Tor browser and Tor birdy that you can combine.  Not to denigrate your 
work

but its fact, their anonymity transport layer is more advanced and has
undergone more scrutiny and is trusted. I've talked with people who 
love
the Freenet concept but are reluctant to use it because they don't 
feel its
powerful enough to withstand NSA. I find it hard to convince them 
otherwise
when there is a trickle of papers about Freenet's anonymity protection 
and

no mention of it being a challenge to NSA like the Tor slides and they
trust what Snowden used.

With that said, Freenet's real power is resilient and distributed data
hosting, unmatched by Tor hidden services that were designed as an
afterthought. Together both technologies are a perfect fit. They 
should not

compete.

My point here is to keep the parts of the protocol where Freenet users 
can
automatically find each other and request data but to offload the 
traffic

hiding part to Tor. Don't put users in a situation where they have to
choose between both. Each project does one thing well and together 
they

give users the cypherpunk vision of freedom.

More users means more technical people who will become interested and 
help
out. It becomes self sustaining. You've built it but you need to 
integrate

it right and they will come.

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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Ian]

Software isn't like playdough, you can't take two different software
projects and just stick them together, and expect the result to make sense
(even if the projects have related goals).

In terms of the benefits of an alliance with Tor I'm afraid you're being
naive.  From Tor's perspective, an "alliance" with Freenet would make
absolutely no sense.  They'd essentially just be diverting developers,
users, and funding away from their own project.  Don't get me wrong,
they're  nice guys, but it would simply be irrational.

Tor and Freenet might be related at a high-level, but this whole idea that
separate software projects should all be glued together into one huge mass
of bloatware is very misguided.  It's the polar opposite of the Unix
philosophy .  I wish people
would stop suggesting it.  It wouldn't solve any problem and would be a
massive waste of time and resources.

Ian.



On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 4:35 PM, 
wrote:

> I am a Freenet user and want you to succeed so look at my words from that
> angle.
>
> You are missing out on an obvious natural alliance with Tor that can bring
> in many benefits from funding, users, publicity and manpower. The Tor
> project also invested a lot in private client side applications like the
> Tor browser and Tor birdy that you can combine.  Not to denigrate your work
> but its fact, their anonymity transport layer is more advanced and has
> undergone more scrutiny and is trusted. I've talked with people who love
> the Freenet concept but are reluctant to use it because they don't feel its
> powerful enough to withstand NSA. I find it hard to convince them otherwise
> when there is a trickle of papers about Freenet's anonymity protection and
> no mention of it being a challenge to NSA like the Tor slides and they
> trust what Snowden used.
>
> With that said, Freenet's real power is resilient and distributed data
> hosting, unmatched by Tor hidden services that were designed as an
> afterthought. Together both technologies are a perfect fit. They should not
> compete.
>
> My point here is to keep the parts of the protocol where Freenet users can
> automatically find each other and request data but to offload the traffic
> hiding part to Tor. Don't put users in a situation where they have to
> choose between both. Each project does one thing well and together they
> give users the cypherpunk vision of freedom.
>
> More users means more technical people who will become interested and help
> out. It becomes self sustaining. You've built it but you need to integrate
> it right and they will come.
>
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> Devl@freenetproject.org
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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[salutarydiacritical23]

I am a Freenet user and want you to succeed so look at my words from 
that angle.


You are missing out on an obvious natural alliance with Tor that can 
bring in many benefits from funding, users, publicity and manpower. The 
Tor project also invested a lot in private client side applications like 
the Tor browser and Tor birdy that you can combine.  Not to denigrate 
your work but its fact, their anonymity transport layer is more advanced 
and has undergone more scrutiny and is trusted. I've talked with people 
who love the Freenet concept but are reluctant to use it because they 
don't feel its powerful enough to withstand NSA. I find it hard to 
convince them otherwise when there is a trickle of papers about 
Freenet's anonymity protection and no mention of it being a challenge to 
NSA like the Tor slides and they trust what Snowden used.


With that said, Freenet's real power is resilient and distributed data 
hosting, unmatched by Tor hidden services that were designed as an 
afterthought. Together both technologies are a perfect fit. They should 
not compete.


My point here is to keep the parts of the protocol where Freenet users 
can automatically find each other and request data but to offload the 
traffic hiding part to Tor. Don't put users in a situation where they 
have to choose between both. Each project does one thing well and 
together they give users the cypherpunk vision of freedom.


More users means more technical people who will become interested and 
help out. It becomes self sustaining. You've built it but you need to 
integrate it right and they will come.

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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Zlatin Balevsky]

> Maybe so, but it means a full rewrite every few years, which we are
> unlikely to have the resources for. Even if we did, it would mean
> throwing out years of hard-won expertise.

That's not necessarily a bad thing.  It forces the accumulation of new
expertise, keeps bringing in new generations of developers and makes sure
the project takes advantage of whatever language advancements have taken
place.  Encourages forking and pits the different implementations against
one another so that the fittest may survive.  OTOH having a single
platform/toolset dictated discourages contributions.  Yes, java is the most
popular language by many metrics, but that popularity does not translate to
a large pool of passionate volunteers.

> But there are other trends that might favour us, e.g. cheap but powerful
router boxes, Raspberry Pi /
> Arduino hobbyist stuff etc.

Every trend can bring more volunteers passionate about it, so all venues
are worth pursuing :)

zab/topiltzin

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 8:57 PM, Matthew Toseland  wrote:

> On 15/10/15 20:40, Zlatin Balevsky wrote:
> > I first got involved in Freenet when it was 0.2.  At the time it was
> using
> > cutting edge technologies and an contributing was an opportunity to learn
> > valuable skills.  Contributing was fun and that was the driving factor.
> >
> > If Freenet was to start fresh, it should do whatever it takes to regain
> the
> > coolness factor.  That means embracing new tools and technologies even if
> > there is no strict technological advantage in doing so.  For better or
> > worse Java will never be hip with the open-source crowd, and personally,
> > after 10 hours of looking at Java code for my day job the last thing I
> want
> > is to look at more Java code in my free time.  Some exotic new language
> > like Scala or Go or whatever the $COOL_LANGUAGE_DU_JOUR is would be a
> > different story.
> Maybe so, but it means a full rewrite every few years, which we are
> unlikely to have the resources for. Even if we did, it would mean
> throwing out years of hard-won expertise.
>
> Can we make it more attractive to new devs without needing to take such
> a drastic step?
> > Yes this can lead to fragmentation as various contributors veer off each
> > into their own direction; it's the job of the leader to keep things
> > coherent and aligned with the project vision.  It's very easy to
> > underestimate how difficult the job of the leader is.
> Agreed.
> > Lastly, I'd like to point out that mobile is the future - not that I like
> > that a single bit.
> If mobile is the future, we're stuffed. Mobile simply can't do p2p. The
> networks will do everything necessary to stop it, and it drains power,
> storage and above all scarce bandwidth. The only realistic options for
> mobile are pure client nodes ("transient mode"), which is what mobile is
> designed for, or variants on Sneakernet. But there are other trends that
> might favour us, e.g. cheap but powerful router boxes, Raspberry Pi /
> Arduino hobbyist stuff etc.
> > zab/topiltzin
>
>
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Re: [freenet-dev] Dependency management was Re: Behind the times

[Arne Babenhauserheide]

Am Donnerstag, 15. Oktober 2015, 18:26:49 schrieb Florent Daigniere:
> On Thu, 2015-10-15 at 17:38 +0200, Arne Babenhauserheide wrote:
> > Though maybe we could also get the same done with easier to follow
> > documentation (just hosting the jars where people can download them)
> 
> Like https://javadoc.freenetproject.org/ ?

No (though that’s good to have), rather like a 5 step guide for
setting up a Freenet development environment, written in the
README. There is README.building.md, but the junit4 and hamcrest
packages never worked for me, and the non-eclipse text is somehow like
a maze to navigate.

There’s “you need these packages” and then two lines are missing:

build Freenet by calling `ant`.
Stop freenet, copy dist/freenet.jar into your freenet folder, then start 
Freenet to run your own bulid.

And a line in README.md which points to README.building.md.

Best wishes,
Arne
--
Ein Würfel System - einfach saubere Regeln: 

- http://1w6.org



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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Arne Babenhauserheide]

Am Donnerstag, 15. Oktober 2015, 11:48:14 schrieb Dan Roberts:
> Regarding fundraising, perhaps it's time to reconsider Patreon,
> Gratipay, and/or Bountysource?

We’re at bountysource now, since they now offer Salt: monthly pay
instead of bounties. https://www.bountysource.com/teams/freenet

I added it, but it isn’t consensus whether we want to keep using it.

Patreon would be great, too. It only works for people who provide
consistent work, and I can’t currently do that. It could be a good fit
for Steve, though.

Best wishes,
Arne


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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Arne Babenhauserheide]

Am Donnerstag, 15. Oktober 2015, 18:33:15 schrieb Florent Daigniere:
> On Wed, 2015-10-14 at 14:22 -0500, Ian Clarke wrote:
> > I think it's time for us all to take a step back and have a serious
> > conversation about where we are, and where we are going.
> > 
> 
> Sounds good. So let's sum it up:
> 
> Yesterday we thought we were in a world where we didn't need Freenet
> and where we couldn't possibly face a passive global adversary.
> 
> Today we know that we need Freenet more than ever... and that we face
> at least one active, global adversary.
> 
> Is "pretending that Opennet can work" still the official project's
> line?

I’ve been saying for quite some time “Opennet is what we need to make
it possible for users to join, Darknet is where we want them as soon
as possible”. And I did not hear anyone argumenting against that. Not
in the past year.

I’m actively using Darknet features so I see where they
suck. Node-to-Node messages are pretty cool, but plagued by usability
issues. And the one thing we need to spread Darknet has been living in
plan-land for years: Darknet invites which connect automatically (via
one-time tokens).

I want to be able to give every one of my friends a USB stick with a
Freenet installer which auto-connects to my Freenet node or my
friends. We have everything needed for that — except for the actually
important code (one-time tokens + FOAF-connecting).

Though, to stop the complaining, I didn’t manage to do that myself
either. I have sufficient skills for that nowadays, just the free
creative time is missing.

Best wishes,
Arne


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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Ian]

In a way, Tahrir  was sort of my attempt to
"reboot" the Freenet concept.  It was motivated by a few realizations:

   - In many of the countries where the Internet is censored, bandwidth is
   a rare concept, yet P2P systems (including Freenet) treat it as being
   practically free (as it often is in wealthy western countries).

   - When we started Freenet, I don't think anyone recognized the power of
   "micro-blogging" systems like Twitter and Facebook.  Conveniently, given
   the previous point, micro-blogging can have much lower bandwidth
   requirements.

So I set about designing it, even getting some students to work on it
through Google Summer of Code.  Progress was made, but unfortunately the
students were far less experienced than they probably needed to be (not
their fault, they were students after all), and we never got it to an
initial working release.

Regarding Java, I don't agree that we should adopt some other programming
language because it's "cool" and Java isn't.  In fact "coolness" is perhaps
the worst possible basis on which to select a programming language!

Java is still the world's most popular programming language, and while it
somewhat stagnated under Sun, Oracle is making progress again, Java8 is the
most significant release since Java5.  I think Java is still the right bet
for these reasons.

As for Scala, I was a fan in the early days, but I think it is has jumped
the shark.  Its type system is too complicated, and its development has
been too undisciplined (with important functionality getting deprecated
without any clear replacements).

My personal favorite post-Java JVM language is Kotlin
.  However, one of the most important
characteristics of any programming language is how many people are
proficient in it, and Java remains the clear winner here.

If I were building a new desktop app starting today, I'd probably still use
Java, but use a JavaScript framework like Bootstrap/React for the
front-end, communicating with a Java back-end via HTTP-REST.

Ian.


On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 2:40 PM, Zlatin Balevsky  wrote:

> I first got involved in Freenet when it was 0.2.  At the time it was using
> cutting edge technologies and an contributing was an opportunity to learn
> valuable skills.  Contributing was fun and that was the driving factor.
>
> If Freenet was to start fresh, it should do whatever it takes to regain the
> coolness factor.  That means embracing new tools and technologies even if
> there is no strict technological advantage in doing so.  For better or
> worse Java will never be hip with the open-source crowd, and personally,
> after 10 hours of looking at Java code for my day job the last thing I want
> is to look at more Java code in my free time.  Some exotic new language
> like Scala or Go or whatever the $COOL_LANGUAGE_DU_JOUR is would be a
> different story.
>
> Yes this can lead to fragmentation as various contributors veer off each
> into their own direction; it's the job of the leader to keep things
> coherent and aligned with the project vision.  It's very easy to
> underestimate how difficult the job of the leader is.
>
> Lastly, I'd like to point out that mobile is the future - not that I like
> that a single bit.
>
> zab/topiltzin
>
> On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 7:48 PM, Dan Roberts  wrote:
>
> > Hi Everyone,
> > Regarding fundraising, perhaps it's time to reconsider Patreon,
> > Gratipay, and/or Bountysource? Personally, I think Patreon may be
> > promising. Afaict it has the largest volume of funding. Somehow the
> public
> > has found money to support lots of silly entertainment projects on a
> > recurring basis (not to denigrate those projects). With the right pitch,
> by
> > appealing to privacy concerns and freedom of expression, I think Freenet
> > has a chance of capturing funding through that platform. Funding software
> > seems to be a difficult proposition to users in general, but it can be
> > done.
> >
> > I doubt these would be sufficient to pay for development but they could
> > keep the lights on. Obviously these suggestions are just suggestions, but
> > from my quick perusal of the archives, it didn't look like Patreon or
> > Gratipay have received serious consideration, and bountysource appeared
> to
> > be more or less ruled out (but bountysource has changed enough to warrant
> > reconsideration too?).
> >
> > If there's interest in any of these options, but lack of time, perhaps I
> > could contribute in that capacity by writing first passes of the
> requisite
> > campaigns, since I doubt I'll be up-to-speed on the code base any time
> > soon.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Dan
> >
> > On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 8:41 AM, Matthew Toseland 
> wrote:
> >
> > > On 15/10/15 00:53, Hunter Poe wrote:
> > > > Hi, there
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >  I have been a user of Freenet for several years now, and am at this
> > > point
> > > > still a pretty junior develop, but finally feel my capabilities hav

Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Matthew Toseland]

On 15/10/15 20:40, Zlatin Balevsky wrote:
> I first got involved in Freenet when it was 0.2.  At the time it was using
> cutting edge technologies and an contributing was an opportunity to learn
> valuable skills.  Contributing was fun and that was the driving factor.
>
> If Freenet was to start fresh, it should do whatever it takes to regain the
> coolness factor.  That means embracing new tools and technologies even if
> there is no strict technological advantage in doing so.  For better or
> worse Java will never be hip with the open-source crowd, and personally,
> after 10 hours of looking at Java code for my day job the last thing I want
> is to look at more Java code in my free time.  Some exotic new language
> like Scala or Go or whatever the $COOL_LANGUAGE_DU_JOUR is would be a
> different story.
Maybe so, but it means a full rewrite every few years, which we are
unlikely to have the resources for. Even if we did, it would mean
throwing out years of hard-won expertise.

Can we make it more attractive to new devs without needing to take such
a drastic step?
> Yes this can lead to fragmentation as various contributors veer off each
> into their own direction; it's the job of the leader to keep things
> coherent and aligned with the project vision.  It's very easy to
> underestimate how difficult the job of the leader is.
Agreed.
> Lastly, I'd like to point out that mobile is the future - not that I like
> that a single bit.
If mobile is the future, we're stuffed. Mobile simply can't do p2p. The
networks will do everything necessary to stop it, and it drains power,
storage and above all scarce bandwidth. The only realistic options for
mobile are pure client nodes ("transient mode"), which is what mobile is
designed for, or variants on Sneakernet. But there are other trends that
might favour us, e.g. cheap but powerful router boxes, Raspberry Pi /
Arduino hobbyist stuff etc.
> zab/topiltzin



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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Zlatin Balevsky]

I first got involved in Freenet when it was 0.2.  At the time it was using
cutting edge technologies and an contributing was an opportunity to learn
valuable skills.  Contributing was fun and that was the driving factor.

If Freenet was to start fresh, it should do whatever it takes to regain the
coolness factor.  That means embracing new tools and technologies even if
there is no strict technological advantage in doing so.  For better or
worse Java will never be hip with the open-source crowd, and personally,
after 10 hours of looking at Java code for my day job the last thing I want
is to look at more Java code in my free time.  Some exotic new language
like Scala or Go or whatever the $COOL_LANGUAGE_DU_JOUR is would be a
different story.

Yes this can lead to fragmentation as various contributors veer off each
into their own direction; it's the job of the leader to keep things
coherent and aligned with the project vision.  It's very easy to
underestimate how difficult the job of the leader is.

Lastly, I'd like to point out that mobile is the future - not that I like
that a single bit.

zab/topiltzin

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 7:48 PM, Dan Roberts  wrote:

> Hi Everyone,
> Regarding fundraising, perhaps it's time to reconsider Patreon,
> Gratipay, and/or Bountysource? Personally, I think Patreon may be
> promising. Afaict it has the largest volume of funding. Somehow the public
> has found money to support lots of silly entertainment projects on a
> recurring basis (not to denigrate those projects). With the right pitch, by
> appealing to privacy concerns and freedom of expression, I think Freenet
> has a chance of capturing funding through that platform. Funding software
> seems to be a difficult proposition to users in general, but it can be
> done.
>
> I doubt these would be sufficient to pay for development but they could
> keep the lights on. Obviously these suggestions are just suggestions, but
> from my quick perusal of the archives, it didn't look like Patreon or
> Gratipay have received serious consideration, and bountysource appeared to
> be more or less ruled out (but bountysource has changed enough to warrant
> reconsideration too?).
>
> If there's interest in any of these options, but lack of time, perhaps I
> could contribute in that capacity by writing first passes of the requisite
> campaigns, since I doubt I'll be up-to-speed on the code base any time
> soon.
>
> Cheers,
> Dan
>
> On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 8:41 AM, Matthew Toseland  wrote:
>
> > On 15/10/15 00:53, Hunter Poe wrote:
> > > Hi, there
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >  I have been a user of Freenet for several years now, and am at this
> > point
> > > still a pretty junior develop, but finally feel my capabilities have
> > > advanced to the point where I would feel comfortable starting to do
> some
> > > work with Freenet and contributing my, albeit limited, skills.
> > >
> > >  As consequence of this I have been following the mailing list a little
> > > more closely the past week or two and it seems to me that one of the
> big
> > > issues is as Ian pointed out Freenet is rather aged, and so are many of
> > the
> > > development methodologies, tools, and libraries, and it appears in
> > > consequence of that, as well as several other hurdles, have made it
> > > difficult for developers to join in the work.
> > >
> > >  This has resulted in a state where as Ian stated, we are basically
> > running
> > > in maintenance mode with a backlog of bugs, and trying to keep things
> > > mostly working. Which at least in my limited experience is often one of
> > the
> > > less exciting tasks in a developers life. In addition because Freenet
> has
> > > been able to stand so long on its own (15 years is quite the lifetime
> for
> > > an application) but has resulted in numerous patches, and as Brookes
> > points
> > > out in the “Mythical Man Month” that when we fix a bug we end up just
> > > introducing more bugs that are subtler.
> > >
> > >  It seems to me that the best way to revitalize Freenet would be to
> > > re-architect and rebuild Freenet, starting with documenting how Freenet
> > is
> > > actually working according to the code. I have found in my rather
> limited
> > > experience that often times when I am forced to verbalize or articulate
> > > what my code is doing can sometimes bring epiphanies that help me make
> > > major breakthroughs (source:
> > > http://story.fund/post/114720918282/debugging-teddy-bea
> > > r). The
> > Freenet
> > > 2.0 as it were could include a modernized build system, if we are
> > concerned
> > > about pulling down insecure dependencies we could look at creating our
> > own
> > > Freenet specific libraries that although this would cause us to
> reinvent
> > > the wheel in some cases it could also help us reevaluate the need for
> the
> > > specific component reducing software bloat, and give us the guarantee
> of
> > > security. We could also move

Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Dan Roberts]

Hi Everyone,
Regarding fundraising, perhaps it's time to reconsider Patreon,
Gratipay, and/or Bountysource? Personally, I think Patreon may be
promising. Afaict it has the largest volume of funding. Somehow the public
has found money to support lots of silly entertainment projects on a
recurring basis (not to denigrate those projects). With the right pitch, by
appealing to privacy concerns and freedom of expression, I think Freenet
has a chance of capturing funding through that platform. Funding software
seems to be a difficult proposition to users in general, but it can be done.

I doubt these would be sufficient to pay for development but they could
keep the lights on. Obviously these suggestions are just suggestions, but
from my quick perusal of the archives, it didn't look like Patreon or
Gratipay have received serious consideration, and bountysource appeared to
be more or less ruled out (but bountysource has changed enough to warrant
reconsideration too?).

If there's interest in any of these options, but lack of time, perhaps I
could contribute in that capacity by writing first passes of the requisite
campaigns, since I doubt I'll be up-to-speed on the code base any time soon.

Cheers,
Dan

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 8:41 AM, Matthew Toseland  wrote:

> On 15/10/15 00:53, Hunter Poe wrote:
> > Hi, there
> >
> >
> >
> >  I have been a user of Freenet for several years now, and am at this
> point
> > still a pretty junior develop, but finally feel my capabilities have
> > advanced to the point where I would feel comfortable starting to do some
> > work with Freenet and contributing my, albeit limited, skills.
> >
> >  As consequence of this I have been following the mailing list a little
> > more closely the past week or two and it seems to me that one of the big
> > issues is as Ian pointed out Freenet is rather aged, and so are many of
> the
> > development methodologies, tools, and libraries, and it appears in
> > consequence of that, as well as several other hurdles, have made it
> > difficult for developers to join in the work.
> >
> >  This has resulted in a state where as Ian stated, we are basically
> running
> > in maintenance mode with a backlog of bugs, and trying to keep things
> > mostly working. Which at least in my limited experience is often one of
> the
> > less exciting tasks in a developers life. In addition because Freenet has
> > been able to stand so long on its own (15 years is quite the lifetime for
> > an application) but has resulted in numerous patches, and as Brookes
> points
> > out in the “Mythical Man Month” that when we fix a bug we end up just
> > introducing more bugs that are subtler.
> >
> >  It seems to me that the best way to revitalize Freenet would be to
> > re-architect and rebuild Freenet, starting with documenting how Freenet
> is
> > actually working according to the code. I have found in my rather limited
> > experience that often times when I am forced to verbalize or articulate
> > what my code is doing can sometimes bring epiphanies that help me make
> > major breakthroughs (source:
> > http://story.fund/post/114720918282/debugging-teddy-bea
> > r). The
> Freenet
> > 2.0 as it were could include a modernized build system, if we are
> concerned
> > about pulling down insecure dependencies we could look at creating our
> own
> > Freenet specific libraries that although this would cause us to reinvent
> > the wheel in some cases it could also help us reevaluate the need for the
> > specific component reducing software bloat, and give us the guarantee of
> > security. We could also move to a more compartmentalized and separated
> > model for Freenet, separating the deamon, and clients, changing the way
> we
> > handle plugins. As well as standardizing testing and development
> > procedures.
> >
> >  An expanded and more concise documentation and a modernization of build
> > tools could lower the bar for entry for new developers which would in
> turn
> > cascade into more devs contributing.
> >
> >  Ultimately we may need to make sacrifices in philosophical purity,  and
> > some compromises on how we want to handle certain aspects of our
> > development or methodology in order to ensure the continued survival of
> > Freenet, because regardless of how secure Freenet is, or how well the
> > source code has been vetted, or how much we trust the repositories we are
> > pulling from. If no one is running it because it has become to kludgy or
> > unwieldy to use or run, we are failing at our fundamental mission of
> > providing secure, anonymous, censorship resistant communication.
> >
> >
> >  Like I said I am still a fairly inexperienced and junior developer and
> > could be quite off base, but these are just my thoughts. I think the
> other
> > option we could do is just send the entire code base and administration
> and
> > everything else over to the NSA and the FBI and ask them to start
> > maintaining

Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[xor]

On Thursday, October 15, 2015 06:33:15 PM Florent Daigniere wrote:
> Is "pretending that Opennet can work" still the official project's
> line?

What is it you request here?
A) Remove Opennet?
B) Keep Opennet but improve Darknet features? This could be things such as 
finishing the code to establish connections to friends of friends.

If it is A:

Is pretending that average humans will know enough Freenet users to make pure 
Darknet work a reasonable estimate?

Is it acceptable to limit freedom of speech to those who have many friends? 
Users for sure won't accept modem speed in the age of upcoming GBit cellphone 
networks.

Is it acceptable to limit freedom of speech to those who want perfect 
security; instead of also providing it to those who accept medium security?

Isn't it enough that we allow people to disable Opennet if they don't want it?

Isn't "pretending that Opennet can work" already proven since it in fact does 
work? I haven't heard of people get legally convicted thanks to Opennet 
security issues.


If it is B:

Yes, it'd be nice to improve Darknet.
I think finishing the FOAF code would be a good idea, given that it is half-
finished already anyway.
However, I think we've spent too much time upon core work while neglecting 
deployment (Debian packages) and client applications; so this should only be 
done if a volunteer steps up to do it, not something which we can do with the 
limited funds we have.


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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Florent Daigniere]

On Wed, 2015-10-14 at 14:22 -0500, Ian Clarke wrote:
> I think it's time for us all to take a step back and have a serious
> conversation about where we are, and where we are going.
> 

Sounds good. So let's sum it up:

Yesterday we thought we were in a world where we didn't need Freenet
and where we couldn't possibly face a passive global adversary.

Today we know that we need Freenet more than ever... and that we face
at least one active, global adversary.

Is "pretending that Opennet can work" still the official project's
line?

Florent

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Re: [freenet-dev] Dependency management was Re: Behind the times

[Florent Daigniere]

On Thu, 2015-10-15 at 17:38 +0200, Arne Babenhauserheide wrote:
> Am Dienstag, 13. Oktober 2015, 21:12:28 schrieb Steve Dougherty:
> > > Why not? It could simplify getting into development a lot if
> > > people
> > > would only have to install a generic java development
> > > environment.
> > It takes extra storage and bandwidth for something the vast
> > majority of
> > people will never need.
> 
> Can we estimate how much that is?

Of course, feel free to.

>  (whether is’t worth it)
> 

It's not. What you're suggesting is just insane. We used to ship the
source code (and unit tests) within the released jar; It's never lead
to a surge in contributors.

> Though maybe we could also get the same done with easier to follow
> documentation (just hosting the jars where people can download them)
> 
> 

Like https://javadoc.freenetproject.org/ ?

Florent

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Re: [freenet-dev] Dependency management was Re: Behind the times

[Arne Babenhauserheide]

Am Dienstag, 13. Oktober 2015, 21:12:28 schrieb Steve Dougherty:
> > Why not? It could simplify getting into development a lot if people
> > would only have to install a generic java development environment.
> It takes extra storage and bandwidth for something the vast majority of
> people will never need.

Can we estimate how much that is? (whether is’t worth it)

Though maybe we could also get the same done with easier to follow
documentation (just hosting the jars where people can download them)

Best wishes,
Arne

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Re: [freenet-dev] Thoughts on 1471 feature set?

[Matthew Toseland]

On 12/10/15 00:33, Steve Dougherty wrote:
> Florent expressed interest in getting the caching store tracker out, [0]
> but we'd also planned for 1471 to transition to a new key as part of
> 1472 requiring Java 7, and that's not implemented yet. Are people
> interested in postponing the Java 7 transition again if it's necessary
> to get 1471 out sooner?
>
> I plan to release 1471-pre2 the weekend of October 24th.
>
> - Steve
>
> [0] https://github.com/freenet/fred/pull/157
Does it try to update essential plugins? There was something about this
in the changelog - needs to be handled with care?



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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Matthew Toseland]

On 15/10/15 00:53, Hunter Poe wrote:
> Hi, there
>
>
>
>  I have been a user of Freenet for several years now, and am at this point
> still a pretty junior develop, but finally feel my capabilities have
> advanced to the point where I would feel comfortable starting to do some
> work with Freenet and contributing my, albeit limited, skills.
>
>  As consequence of this I have been following the mailing list a little
> more closely the past week or two and it seems to me that one of the big
> issues is as Ian pointed out Freenet is rather aged, and so are many of the
> development methodologies, tools, and libraries, and it appears in
> consequence of that, as well as several other hurdles, have made it
> difficult for developers to join in the work.
>
>  This has resulted in a state where as Ian stated, we are basically running
> in maintenance mode with a backlog of bugs, and trying to keep things
> mostly working. Which at least in my limited experience is often one of the
> less exciting tasks in a developers life. In addition because Freenet has
> been able to stand so long on its own (15 years is quite the lifetime for
> an application) but has resulted in numerous patches, and as Brookes points
> out in the “Mythical Man Month” that when we fix a bug we end up just
> introducing more bugs that are subtler.
>
>  It seems to me that the best way to revitalize Freenet would be to
> re-architect and rebuild Freenet, starting with documenting how Freenet is
> actually working according to the code. I have found in my rather limited
> experience that often times when I am forced to verbalize or articulate
> what my code is doing can sometimes bring epiphanies that help me make
> major breakthroughs (source:
> http://story.fund/post/114720918282/debugging-teddy-bea
> r). The Freenet
> 2.0 as it were could include a modernized build system, if we are concerned
> about pulling down insecure dependencies we could look at creating our own
> Freenet specific libraries that although this would cause us to reinvent
> the wheel in some cases it could also help us reevaluate the need for the
> specific component reducing software bloat, and give us the guarantee of
> security. We could also move to a more compartmentalized and separated
> model for Freenet, separating the deamon, and clients, changing the way we
> handle plugins. As well as standardizing testing and development
> procedures.
>
>  An expanded and more concise documentation and a modernization of build
> tools could lower the bar for entry for new developers which would in turn
> cascade into more devs contributing.
>
>  Ultimately we may need to make sacrifices in philosophical purity,  and
> some compromises on how we want to handle certain aspects of our
> development or methodology in order to ensure the continued survival of
> Freenet, because regardless of how secure Freenet is, or how well the
> source code has been vetted, or how much we trust the repositories we are
> pulling from. If no one is running it because it has become to kludgy or
> unwieldy to use or run, we are failing at our fundamental mission of
> providing secure, anonymous, censorship resistant communication.
>
>
>  Like I said I am still a fairly inexperienced and junior developer and
> could be quite off base, but these are just my thoughts. I think the other
> option we could do is just send the entire code base and administration and
> everything else over to the NSA and the FBI and ask them to start
> maintaining them, I’m sure they would totally dig that. ;)
>
>
> Sincerely,
>
> A concerned citizen opposed to a surveillance state.
It is perfectly possible to resolve problems without rewriting from
scratch. Sometimes we need to rewrite a subsystem. Documentation does
not automatically come with a new design, and many problems can be
solved by incremental refactoring.

One big problem at the moment is lack of review capacity: Rewrite a
whole subsystem and it may take a year to get merged because the release
manager doesn't have time to review it. This happened with my rewrite of
the client layer last year. This is an area where paid staff could be
really helpful (although obviously that shouldn't be their sole role).

As for the rest, IMHO a lot of it is simply because Freenet is an open
source project, which hasn't reached the critical mass - and in fact
never will - that Linux, Apache, Bitcoin, LibreOffice and Firefox have
reached. In most of these cases there are major corporations
contributing full-time developers. That will never be the case for
Freenet. As for the rest, the internet hype and fundraising machine
(Kickstarter, the wider dot com bubble, and the press) is largely around
start-ups - profitable businesses. Doing something as a non-profit means
we need to be good at fund-raising - either on the micro- level, or on
the funding application level.



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Re: [freenet-dev] Dependency management was Re: Behind the times

[Arne Babenhauserheide]

Am Dienstag, 13. Oktober 2015, 18:07:02 schrieb Ian:
> If your bootstrap gcc isn't compiled from source then it's irrelevant what
> else is.  http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?TheKenThompsonHack

There are ways to counter that to some degree:
http://www.dwheeler.com/trusting-trust/

Fully Countering Trusting Trust through Diverse Double-Compiling (DDC)
  - Countering Trojan Horse attacks on Compilers

Best wishes,
Arne
-- 
Unpolitisch sein
heißt politisch sein, 
ohne es zu merken. 
- Arne (http://draketo.de)




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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[Matthew Toseland]

On 15/10/15 00:44, Steve Dougherty wrote:
> I think another thing being staffed by volunteers has done is made the
> project rather directionless. By their nature volunteers tend to work
> on what they find interesting, and it doesn't build toward a focused
> goal. Volunteers are great at polishing and adding small things, but
> usually can't have the focus and time that paid / full-time developers
> do to make large changes.
Dire mistakes can be made in the opposite direction too. Everything from
writing unmaintainable code to meet deadlines and get new users to
trying to facilitate volunteers and getting pulled in every direction
simultaneously resulting in nothing getting done.

IMHO to be successful we need most of the work to be done by volunteers,
even if we *do* have paid staff too. It *is* useful to have paid staff,
to do things that wouldn't get done otherwise, either because they are
too big and need a sustained effort, or because they are important but
not of interest to volunteers.

As for the rest, I absolutely agree we suck at raising funds, but we
could be a lot more active about it.



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Re: [freenet-dev] Project Status

[xor]

On Wednesday, October 14, 2015 02:22:43 PM Ian Clarke wrote:
> I think it's time for us all to take a step back and have a serious
> conversation about where we are, and where we are going.
> 
> Our current bank account balance is US$1,184.32, our current PayPal balance
> is $1,201.60.

I vote for keeping as much of this locked as is required for 1 year of paying 
maintenance costs such as the server. We should also offer Arne & Florent the 
service of paying their travel costs for the EU-parliament thing; so please 
also allocate that.

> Even at Xor's very low hourly rate (he could get a lot more commercially
> given his skillset - which we should all appreciate him for)

You just made me very happy, thank you :)
I had feared I appeared like a failure after the big pull-request-merge-policy 
flamewar etc. I will keep trying to improve my communication skills! :)

> this is less
> than 100 hours of remaining availability. He needs to prepare for finding
> an alternate income source

Freenet is in a fortunate situation here:
I can keep working for some months *without* immediate payment.
I won't search a new job.

I offer to write my bills as fully interest-free debt, with no time limit for 
payment whatsoever. "Pay as soon as there are enough donations". Also, to 
reduce your work, this could be batch-payment of at least one monthly invoice 
at a time. You don't need to bother to send $ 10 to me.
I'd say as a compensation I'd like to sometimes arbitrarily reduce my hour 
count somewhat when I need more real life time for the stuff which is 
explained in the following section. I'll try to keep the reduction at less 
than 30%.

Reasons for the decision to not get a new job are:

1) I love Freenet.
I want to keep the job. We haven't even tried to do a fundraiser yet, and I 
think if we do actually try, we should be able to get funding.
Also, I want to finish fixing WoT performance. The stuff has become part of my 
personal life goals and I want to get it done. The fact that the performance 
has been annoying users for years is something which I just cannot take 
anymore. I someday want to get to the point where Sone/Freetalk and all the 
other nice applications built on top of it are bundled by default.

2) Me and my mom's plans to move to Berlin:
She's at the point in her life where she cannot maintain her house anymore, so 
it needs to be sold off. Emptying it out is a lot of work (~ 1-2 years left I 
suppose) - which by the way is one of the reasons for my previous hour count 
not reaching full-time work.
I also personally cannot take living at the end of the world much longer, I 
want to get to a place where there is life.
It would be stupid to get another job now: This would require churning out 
crazy hours to prove my worthiness, which would only delay moving to Berlin. 
And every month we still live here is an annoyance for us.
So if Freenet cannot afford to pay me for a while, I should rather use this as 
an opportunity to lower my sitting-at-the-computer-time a bit and speed up the 
moving. My mom for sure would lend me my very basic living costs if I became 
her part-time "employee" to clean her place out.

If you wonder why I don't just volunteer then, please notice that it would 
make me feel very bad personally at my age to actually live off my mom's money 
without paying it back. I would feel huge guilt. So I need to continue working 
for money to pay her back someday, even if I don't get it right away.

> We have a new website in the works, which is great, and many people have
> been working valiantly to support the project, but it's hard to escape the
> feeling that we're almost in a "maintenance mode".   The problem with that
> is that you just can't generate enough excitement to attract funding in
> that situation.

First of all, Freenet isn't *that* dead. The mailing list looks dead, but IRC 
is quite alive. People just prefer IRC. And there, I feel like the influx of 
new people has increased a lot the past years.

With regards to funding:

I think finishing the new website definitely is something we should do before 
a fundraiser.
But nevertheless, I would say that the reason we don't get funding is much 
more simple than "website sucks" / "code is too difficult to understand":
We just didn't even really ask for money yet!

Steve and Arne did ask a few people which I am thoroughly thankful for.
But a real fundraiser can be much larger:
- Big red alert on the website, like Wikipedia does it.
- Contact dozens of potential funders instead of 2-3.
- Do a press release & contact dozens of news sites.

To get a grasp of how many people we could ask, just have a look at how many I 
could enumerate on the Wiki in a day's work without even doing real googling:
https://wiki.freenetproject.org/Fundraising

I would say we wait another 2-3 weeks to see whether a volunteer steps up to 
contact many people; and if none does, I move from code-writing to 
fundraising.

I would of course prefer to keep w