From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Oct 16 18:20:18 2014 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher AECDH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id AAFEF982 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 2014 18:20:18 +0000 (UTC) Received: from be-well.ilk.org (be-well.ilk.org [23.30.133.173]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8629FB09 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 2014 18:20:18 +0000 (UTC) Received: by be-well.ilk.org (Postfix, from userid 1147) id 0F29E33C46; Thu, 16 Oct 2014 14:20:16 -0400 (EDT) From: Lowell Gilbert To: Walter Subject: Re: minder References: <543ED1D6.3000500@saveouraquifer.org> Reply-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2014 14:20:16 -0400 In-Reply-To: <543ED1D6.3000500@saveouraquifer.org> (Walter's message of "Wed, 15 Oct 2014 15:58:14 -0400") Message-ID: <4461fjvpun.fsf@be-well.ilk.org> User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.3 (berkeley-unix) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.18-1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2014 18:20:18 -0000 Walter writes: > I'm wanting to have (or write) a utility to keep a list of IP addresses > of various computers so I can connect to them over the internet. > I found 'minder' in the ports which seems to say that's what it does, > but I can't find documentation on how to use it; the website: > http://www.alhem.net/project/minder/ is not helpful. Anyone? That's essentially a library for keeping track of peers, but the only application example seems to be a trivial test client. It might be able to locate peers as well, but I haven't run across that functionality so it may not exist. It may be a useful tool in building a useful system, but it's a fairly small piece. > On the other hand, if I write my own I can then expand it to do > other p2p things, like synchronize file directories, chat, messages, > remote program activation, et cetera. I looked a bit at: > > bitmessage - current > retroshare - current > kenosis - not current (last news: 2005) > Kademlia - various > dox - unknown > opendchub - current > microdc2 - ^^^^^ > > but it's hard to know how useful these are without trying them all, > and I'm hoping people here can guide me. Unlikely. Personal preferences are going to be a major factor. > Ultimately, I'm interested > in secure, encrypted p2p operations starting with basic messaging, > which will run on Windows-something, Mac, and Linux (BSD) OS's. Try not to develop homegrown encryption or encrypted protocols. Unlike other kinds of programming, you can't establish its correctness by testing. Mac, Linux, and BSD are all distinct. But they're all POSIX-compliant, which is probably good enough for using the same code for the core functionality, and there are toolkits that can make a lot of GUI work reusable. Windows is more difficult as far as compatibility, but not impossible. Still, you're talking about a very big project.