Update 26th June, 2025


After last week’s slightly downbeat update, we’re pleased to announce that things are very much back on track, with uploads and downloads now producing minimal errors as we scale-up tests.

In addition to these fixes, the latest version of Autonomi also features client light networking (CLN). In case you need a reminder, CLN represents a significant code cull replacing 12k lines of code with a minimalistic 2.3k lines that the client can use. It’s huge code simplification client-side that should lead to significant performance and maintainability improvements. It also allows us to refactor node networking without having to worry about the client as both are separate.

So, it’s a stripping down of the code base, removing stuff that’s out of date, didn’t work, or was getting in the way. It’s a back-to-basics move as we focus on creating a reliable and high-performance infrastructure. And the good news is, it’s working. We’re still testing, but the worrisome errors we were seeing last week on scaling up seem to have gone.

Prioritising performance

Right now we’re making sure we have a reliable network so that applications like the Impossible Futures finalists can become a reality. For now that means putting NAT traversal and equality of earning on the back burner. It’s a complex issue, but the number of combinations of home routers and constantly changing ISP rules means we can’t yet guarantee that every node can earn. All cloud nodes should be capable of earning (as there’s no router), and most home setups will too - but not all. Reliably traversing symmetric NAT is a recognised ‘Hard Problem’ in decentralised networking, and rather than continuing to bash our heads against this particular wall we’ve decided to revisit at a later date. If your particular router/ISP combo is blocking you (i.e. you’re not earning), take comfort in the fact that you’re not alone, and don’t worry, you’re not missing out on life-changing earnings at the moment anyway! We’ll get there when we can.

The recent changes mean that only the latest version’s nodes are going to be earning from now, so make sure you upgrade without delay! Latest versions: antnode: v0.4.1, antctld: v0.13.1, antctl: v0.13.1, ant: v0.4.2, nat-detection: v0.2.21, node-launchpad: v0.5.10

In summary then:

The latest version of Autonomi is a big step towards seamless uploading/downloading and permanent data. Are we there yet? Time and testing will tell. Once that’s in place our partners and our fantastic Impossible Futures projects can get going in earnest.

A small number of home nodes will sadly not be able to earn yet. Our vision has always been that anyone should be able to provide resources and earn ANT, but reliable workarounds for symmetric NAT are just not out there in the technosphere just now. We’re not giving up, but uploading/downloading is our priority for now.

But a surefire way to lose out is to avoid upgrading! So upgrade! Remember: Old nodes get nowt!

Community stars

Massive props to @josh for Atlas, a place where you can share things that you find interesting on Autonomi. “It’s amazing! This is the best thing done with the network ever. Fact. An entirely new social platform birthed on a brand new network,” writes a Mr Guy Storage.

@zettawatt introduced Colony Utils – a CLI interface for Colony, a local-first, metadata sharing and semantic search library for Autonomi. :clap:

And @safemedia spoiled us with a Rust client that runs dweb, AntTP and Ant on the Autonomi Browser Extension, with functionality to change AntTP and dweb ports on the local client.

Comms and social**

@dirvine has always been fascinated by the relationship between data, information and knowledge, and how we exchange that knowledge. Hear how he was initially inspired and later disappointed by Bitcoin and blockchain as an enabler to the free transfer and sharing of knowledge, how corporations have co-opted the web, and how Autonomi can do for knowledge what Bitcoin did for money (No X account required).

General progress

@chriso has been labouring away at the release candidate (RC) that fixes many of the issues documented in last week’s update. This should mean more reliable uploads and downloads and fewer errors.

@anselme has been looking at how libp2p handles retries when uploading chunks. There seems to be a lot of replicated activity there, and together with @qi_ma he is looking at how to simplify things.

Lajos tested the paymaster and client front end and looked into how to transpose the Typescript PoC that uses the Pimlico SDK to Rust, to be used later with the client.

Ermine is working on ironing out the bugs in Launchpad and its upgrade process.

@qi_ma has been working with Anselme to remove unnecessary retries. Along with @bzee, he’s also been looking at an upcoming release of libp2p and considering whether that will solve some of our connectivity issues for lower-performing nodes, or if we may need to fork some parts of the codebase to make it work properly for us. As mentioned above, this is now on the back burner.

@roland’s been the main man crushing the upload/download bugs, putting in overtime to create some inspired fixes that have seen these tend to zero. Elsewhere, we’ve fixed a couple major things w.r.t. how connections are established and who node let into the routing table. We no longer accept a node’s self advertised ID, and we also delay dialling newly connected nodes until UDP connection has died (180 seconds). Live UDP connections were making nodes appear to be reachable when they weren’t. We now need to gradually remove non-reachable nodes from the network. These are nodes that are behind an unsupported NAT setup or one that’s is not port forwarded. Relayed nodes are not affected by this, in fact they should see some performance improvements.

@vphongph has been engaged in logging spawned nodes for testing purposes, which is a challenge as node ID is generated after spawning.

And @shu, as always, has been providing invaluable visibility into the results of our testing.

52 Likes

What a great news. Keep going. Thank you :heart:

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Awesome news on the CLN! Looking forward to this. A few general questions, what impact does this have on the current rust API? Are there new error conditions and what not that we need to be aware of? Anything special to be on the lookout for?

Great work overall. Thank you for focusing on the technicalities and network performance. This is exactly what we need right now!

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Does port forwarding help these people?

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Great update!

What’s that?

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At the core off this, even with port forwarding, you would have to determine if you are on symmetric nat or full cone nat or port restricted nat, or CGNAT etc from your home router/ISP. If you are behind a router and in a full cone nat topology, you should be good (its a clean port forward similar to being on a VPS/Cloud VM).

If you are on a symmetric nat or port restricted nat, or CGNAT, you will likely have to use --relay option to be able to connect and earn, if the other two options (public VM or full cone nat) are not feasible for you.

As mentioned in prior update here: (Update 19th June, 2025 - #23 by Shu) (see below):

There are a series off PRs in the works to rely on connection information than identify, including 180 second dial backs, and eventually automatically reach a conclusion on the type of node/network topology you are on so flags such as --no-upnp, --relay, --ip etc would not be required.

The process would be super streamlined including auto-detecting which network adapter is transmitting and receiving traffic for antnodes running within the OS as well etc.

All of the above needs to be rolled out in phases with majority off the code base for node operators to be on the latest versions to have maximum impact towards a healthier network.


With today’s release, some of these parts/phases have been rolled out, but more to come in future releases, though as the update states, the priority has been on improving downloader & uploader behavior especially with CLN, especially on mainnet and for the IF program.

19 Likes

Nowt means nothing if your nodes are old don’t expect any ant :slight_smile:

Was in bed look at the phone and a midnight update :slight_smile:

That’s definitely a first :1st_place_medal:

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So, if this Scots dictionary is to be believed, it means that people who run old nodes will get oxen, bulls or cows. Probably depending on what they have in stock that day

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They can think what ever they want but they will end up with Nowt :joy:

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Doesn’t it mean desexed

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Fantastic work on this massive code simplification. Looking forward to seeing how uploads and downloads have improved. They already weren’t too shabby, so even better would be amazing.

It makes sense to be prioritising the core network performance above all else right now. Except perhaps some native token work. Both good technology and good economics are needed for network success :squinting_face_with_tongue:) Once performance is steady, other things can be progressed.

Community dev work is fantastic & progress is swift. Playing with Atlas a bit was fun & promising, and once the browser extension & Colony are readily available, they should be great tools to make using Autonomi and finding stuff easier.

David’s chat on the Spaces was also very interesting & illuminating.

Again, fantastic work team Autonomi, both at MaidSafe and in the community. The groundwork being done now will help the network come to life in the coming weeks and months I am sure.

Well done all you amazing people. Keep up the good work! :clap: :clap: :clap:

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Well, I’m here for the free oxen. No way I’m upgrading my nodes.

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Thanks so much to the entire Autonomi team for all of your hard work! :flexed_biceps: :flexed_biceps: :flexed_biceps:

The community is making great contributions! That’s what sets us above the rest.

:thankyou:

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Small improvement. Launchpad on linux was about to start nodes with Control+G again.

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Nice work team.

I’m guessing from hint in this update that refactor of node networking is next big item - now that CLN is ready? Or something else?

Cheers :beers:

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Thx 4 the update Maidsafe devs and your hard work

This for me is the main reason why I’m so in “love” and ‘laser-focused’ on this project. I bet that even AlphaEvolve can learn from how you kids code…

@zettawatt @josh @safemedia :clap: :clap: :clap:

Upgrade was a breeze: Can we please have this as tagline :face_blowing_a_kiss:

In the Node LaunchPad :sweat_smile:

:heart_eyes: :clap: Hopefully all you super ants know that your the black :hole:/neutron star/ :star: in this Autonomi universe…

Clueless as always about all matters, but would be fun if NRS was node’s their advertised idea

Never give up!

:star_struck: @dirvine transferring knowledge :exploding_head: is indeed more valuable than…

Keep hacking super ants

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I’m currently on a trip, back on monday. I hope my nodes are not banned forever meanwhile..

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Great to see the team limiting the scoop of work taken on at the moment,
I am fine with taking on the task to get a public IP-address from the ISP. Works very nice, just need to approve the traffic in windows the first time a new port is used.

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Great job, bravo to the team and developers :clap: :clap: :clap:

This is great news as it seemed to me that somewhere along the way to ultimate success the network started to get complicated, going back to the roots - ‘first don’t complicate’ - is a sign that priorities are not changing and we are not looking for compromises just solutions, we are on track!:backhand_index_pointing_left: :ok_hand: :blush:

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