Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System

Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by bawolff on Monday October 10, 2022 @02:29AM (#33148423)

Just use a public key as your address, and make signed pointers to the actual content. That's how people have been solving the update problem for ages.

Naming things continues to be one of the hard problems in computer science.

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Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by toomim on Monday October 10, 2022 @03:37AM (#33148782)

Then it's no longer content-addressing. It's now "public key plus a signed pointer referencing a name-that-has-yet-to-be-specified" addressing.

I think that's a fine road to go down for addressing data, but it's not content addressing.

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Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by bawolff on Monday October 10, 2022 @11:11AM (#33152358)

Why not? If you include the public key with the signed pointer, then you can define a "hash" function that returns just the pubkey (yes with collisions, but not in a way that matters) and it is content-addressing. After all, you are literally addressing by content in this scheme.

What is actually the difference in any way that matters? What property does content addressing have that this doesn't.

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Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by theGnuMe on Monday October 10, 2022 @12:51PM (#33153679)

I mean a content hash that redirects if it is deprecated?

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Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by zcw100 on Monday October 10, 2022 @10:23AM (#33151790)

And that's exactly what IPNS does. You can also use DNS with DNSLink.

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Re:Why the Internet Needs the InterPlanetary File System by bawolff on Monday October 10, 2022 @11:12AM (#33152367)

Its what everyone does. The technique predates ipfs and friends by a long time.

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