SAFE-VFS Update

[happybeing]

SAFE-VFS (Virtual File System) makes your SAFE network storage appear on your device like a local hard drive. So any application you use can save or load files to and from your SAFE storage, including when you use the command line (which is what makes it such a good demo - see below). So it’s also able to function like a command line version of the Web Hosting Manager (WHM), and provides both a locally mounted drive with access to all your SAFE storage (_public, _private etc) and a way to create public IDs and SAFE services with simple commands. It was originally built in Ruby by @anon71598723 on alpha1 but has not been updated for alpha2.

I’ve pestered several joiners over time (sorry @JohnVonNeumann and @brianp to name two ) trying to find somebody who would like to update it but so far this awesome project has languished, so…

I’d like to suggest it as a low cost (code already exists) high value project for the CEP. Please click Vote above this post if you want this to happen.

Being able to register a domain and create a website and publish it forever with four commands is a demo that will blow anyone who can understand it away.

Here are those commands:

How to create a website:

# website files
mkdir public/my-dir
echo “Hello world!” > public/my-dir/index.html

# publishing
mkdir dns/my-app
ln -s public/my-dir dns/my-app/www

Then, open safe://www.my-app, you will see your “Hello world!”.

The above:

• uploads a website to the network
• registers a SAFEnetwork web domain and
• publishes that website forever (nothing else to do, nothing else to pay)

This is both incredibly useful, and one of the most powerful demonstrations of SAFEnetwork I can imagine, and so I’d love us to have it again and see what our marketeers can do with it. See more…

[whiteoutmashups]

I like it. And in the spirit of SAFE-FS I voted

It’s not like only one thing from these vote choices actually happens, right?

Lots of these CEP ideas can happen, right?

There’s so many things we need to do :0 not just one idea

[frabrunelle]

@whiteoutmashups

Lots of these CEP ideas can happen, right?

Yes, but initially we would only select 1 idea at a time

If an idea doesn’t get selected during a poll, it could still potentially get selected during a later poll.

See this post for more info:

@frabrunelle

Depending on the number of ideas that are submitted, we might do polls for selecting new RFPs more often and on a regular basis (e.g. every 2 weeks). Initially, we think we should just do 1 poll every few weeks for the first few times we run through the process. We would rather start small and scale up initially as going too fast with too many projects could turn a bit messy if we don’t stay on top of things.

Also, a poll might include more than 5 options (e.g. we could include the top 10 ideas with the most votes) if many ideas are submitted around the same time.

[Nigel]

@happybeing I thought the virtual file system was so SAFE showed up on your computer as a virtual drive for storage. I guess I’m confused by the publishing a simple Safe site as this can be done with the web hosting manager. Just looking for some clarification. Thanks

[neo]

@Nigel

I guess I’m confused by the publishing a simple Safe site as this can be done with the web hosting manager. Just looking for some clarification. Thanks

When you write to public then anyone can read the files and by creating a DNS entry people then can access your files (site) using your DNS ID see example of @happybeing

[happybeing]

@Nigel It’s a command line version of the WHM, so it is both a locally mounted drive with access to all your SAFE storage (_public, _private etc) and a way to create public IDs and SAFE services.

[Nigel]

Okay cool, thanks for the clarification Mark.

[happybeing]

No worries, you made me realise I hadn’t explained it adequately so I’ve updated the OP.

P. S. To all: If you like SAFE-VFS please click Vote at the top of this topic!

[draw]

And of course directory path ‘public/my-dir’ has to be in a correctly mounted directory, like described here:

SAFE as a mountable disk (safe-vfs): First version

Hey guys, as I mentioned in this topic I created this mountable virtual file-system app for Linux. Download / Install: > wget “https://github.com/loureirorg/safe-vfs/raw/master/mount.safevfs” > chmod +x mount.safevfs Usage: > ./mount.safevfs /mnt/test Where “/mnt/test” is your mounting point. Example: Creating/publishing a website mkdir public/my-dir echo “Hello world!” > public/my-dir/index.html mkdir dns/my-app ln -s public/my-dir dns/my-app/www Then open safe://www.my-app …

Ps: Maybe it is also possible and useful to change the now on Github popular file uploader Uppy to also be able to upload/download files from the Safe Network? To be clear: I’m not saying this has to be a CEP idea, nor do I garantuee that I have time to do this myself.

[Nigel]

I don’t want to hijack this thread but I’ve been really eager to know how the cross pollination with solid is going.

[happybeing]

I haven’t touched Solid over the holidays but hope to pick it up again very soon. I’ll post an update as soon as I have something to report. Glad to hear of your interest

[psecdocumentary]

This is also brilliant because if someone also runs a personal webserver on the regular internet, then /public could also be mapped to /var/www allowing for the website to simultaneously exist on both the regular internet and SafeNet at the exact same time.

Then when regular Internet users see all of the “safenet stuff” all over the website and they wonder “SafeNet? Whats that?” — now your website has also just doubled as a PR campaign for SafeNet, with no hard sell required!

-Dave

[happybeing]

It’s an interesting idea, but won’t work very well because only static websites (ie sites which don’t use the SAFE API at all) would function correctly, and is hard to see this as introducing people to SAFE unless that is the purpose of the site.

I’m curious about innovative ways to introduce people to SAFE such as this though.

Meanwhile, the VFS is on its way back…

SAFE Drive - mount your SAFE storage as virtual drive

[benshurts]

This is freakin awesome!

[psecdocumentary]

I think it would world great for limited function, as you already stated. Often times, a static website is all someone needs. In those instances, this of course would work well.

One thing I am totally unsure of, is how it would translate the other way. What I mean is – what if a site is running e107 or Joomla or PhpNuke or something that the Apache Web Server is handling? If someone on the SafeNet side tried to use the site, would the Apache Web Server respond at all? If not, then things that require php, etc would not function on the SafeNet end of things. If however the SafeNet side were able to recognize regular http and https links (I think it can, yeah?) then it would activate those functions via the regular internet way.

As for SafeNet functions on the web, some sort of gateway bridge would need to be created and I’m sure even that would be limited, at least at first.

But even having a little bit of function and the site being able to co-exist on both networks, is still cool just in and of itself. Besides, even if a “limited function gateway” was created, limiting a function to prompt the user for the option of an upgrade, is a workable marketing strategy.

Just as you can tell code to only display a message if a person is using a particular browser, you can have messages inside of a website that only display if they are not viewing the site from the SafeNet side of things.

There might be a text box or line of text next to a function that says something like “SafeNet features are limited outside of SafeNet. Click Here for details on how to activate full functionality. Using SafeNet is completely free of charge”.

[psecdocumentary]

By the way, it would also be nice to have some sort of simple GTK-based GUI Manager to create, delete, mount and unmount VFS systems.

Besides SAFE-VFS of course, other options could include: SSH, FTP, WEBDAV, NFS, SAMBA.

I already use SSHFS via some simple scripts that load on startup.

echo PASSWORD | sshfs USER@LOCAL-IP-ADDRESS:/path-to-folder/ /media/USERNAME/mount-point -o workaround=rename -o password_stdin

[psecdocumentary]

Another idea that just came to mind on this, is how to power a script that accesses SafeNet functionality from the “regular internet side” of things. You make a script similar to how WebTorrent operates.

With WebTorrent, this allows a regular website to not need much of its own bandwidth to deliver content. The users of the website are sharing their bandwidth as they use the site. The users are not required to download or install any software to be able to do this.

Similarly, a web script could be created for regular websites that allow regular Internet users to act as temporary SafeNet nodes. This would allow them to share their bandwidth with SafeNet as they browse a SafeNet powered site via the regular Internet.

It could be called WebParsec.