I just recently came across IPFS. I quickly found out that steemit uses it shortly after that. I haven't posted on here for a while but when I found that out I had to write about it. I am considering using ipfs for a new project of mine and wanted to research it a little further. What better way to learn something than to write about it. When I first read about it I thought it would be a perfect fit for an idea I have around blockchain and idea sharing.
You can upload your pictures directly on here to get them into ipfs or you can put them on your own server if you want. There are also options like ipfs.pic for picture sharing and ipfstube that is able to be used for video sharing. This is great if you don't want to have the ability to be censored by other medias.
Imagine being able to access files on anyone's computer's file system that is willing to share their files in a secure way. Using some of the technology behind bitcoin and blockchain, the merkle tree and others that is possible now. According to their documentation IPFS (the InterPlanetary File System) is a new hypermedia distribution protocol, addressed by content and identities. IPFS enables the creation of completely distributed applications. It aims to make the web faster, safer, and more open.
IPFS is a distributed file system that seeks to connect all computing devices with the same system of files. In some ways, this is similar to the original aims of the Web, but IPFS is actually more similar to a single bittorrent swarm exchanging git objects.
IPFS is becoming a new major subsystem of the internet. If built right, it could complement or replace HTTP. It could complement or replace even more. It sounds crazy. It is crazy.
IPFS is still in alpha testing and more is being developed on it everyday. From what I have found so far it is trying to link and create archive for the entire web while distributing and decentralizing the content. By doing this the data will be able to be shared peer to peer without necessarily having to connect to a remote server where all the content is stored. No more uploading something to drop box just so everyone can retrieve it. You can give them access to the one on your computer directly or just pass along a hash of the copy of it already in ipfs somewhere else. This enables for opportunity for lower bandwidth to be used and for remote areas to have access to it without needed to be directly connected to the backbone of the internet. It could open up information sharing to so much more of the world this way and make it feasible to do so without huge data centers popping up in remote areas of the world.
According to the source, this part is reliable with other parts being a work in progress. It is the 'thin waist' that everything goes through in order to link the data together. This part helps connect to other merkel chains already in use and sets them in a common hash format, referred to as the 'merkle forest' . This part makes it easier to interact with things like github and already established blockchains. The newly created forest system will enable for easier APIs to be written and used through this. The two areas that are still a work in progress with this are IPLD Selectors and Transformations. From what I have gathered Selectors would help enable for 'Selecting' a portion of the forest you are interested for you application. You could imagine if we start connecting every file on the internet it could get messy and hard to ingest for a person. This selector would help dig through this and allow you to connect to nodes that you might not directly know about but are linked in some way to what you are working with. The Transformations is another thing that I am not entirely sure about. From what I read so far it appears to be how a file or a set of files can be brought together or changed to form another file/set of files(or graph) I guess a simple example would be a slideshow of pictures. You can transfrom a group of pictures into a slide show or presentation of some sort. You would just link to the picture content hashes and place them together in order to do so.
I am very excited to learn more about IPFS and the applications and use cases for it. It sounds like a great project and would love to incorporate it into more future work. I just started using it and wanted to share what I have learned so far. Please realize I am still new to it so if I said something confusing or mispoke please correct me. As I learn more I may write about it and share my experiences. I hope it continues to grow like it appears is has been over the last couple years.
