More info on software

[cdokolas]

I think it would be indispensable to indicate platform availability (i.e. *nix, Mac, Windows, other) and difficulty of installation/use (beginner, poweruser, guru) for each tech.

[rossjones]

That sounds like a LOT of work ;) Am sure it'll get there, but probably slowly.

[Z-Corbett]

Not sure if this has been started, but I imagine I can add a few details to this part of the project, or just send you the info on what's best for which OS & software reqs etc.

[nimdahk]

Starting off with stuff I use, in alphabetical order (platforms are in a rough order of popularity)

• Bitmessage runs on Python and requires the OpenSSL library.
  • Supports Windows, Mac OS X (with a bit of work), most Linuxes (Debian Squeeze, for example, requires OpenSSL updates) and FreeBSD (since this commit)
  • Can NOT be run on Android currently.
• Bitcoin
  • Supports Windows, Android (via Bitcoin Wallet, among others), web (via Blockchain.info, among others), Mac OS X, most Linuxes, most BSDs
• Freenet runs on Java
  • Supports Windows, Mac OSX, most Linuxes, FreeBSD
• i2p runs on Java
  • Supports Windows, Mac OS X, most Linuxes, most BSDs, Solaris
• Tor
  • Supports Windows, Android (via Orbot), Apple OS X, most Linuxes, BSD, Unix
  • There are also web portals like onion.to, but these are completely unsafe, and only implement .onion access.

[cdokolas]

@nimdahk: Can you fork the project, put this info on the page and request a pull? The reason rossjones put it on github is so that people can contribute. I'm only sorry that my only contribution is this issue.

[snj33v]

github pages can help since list is getting bigger

[rossjones]

Perhaps we should build it directly into redecentralize.org? Would be very good to try and categorize them before doing something like that though (and a simple search given redecentralize.org is currently hosted on pages).

[berkus]

I believe it's pretty good as it is. You can edit it in your own fork and it's properly formatted when viewed as a repository. Not sure if splitting it up into pages or wiki is good at this stage. (Given that github wiki works the same - by pulling changes)

[rossjones]

Only 6 months later.... :)

Some students have broken everything up into json files (title, description) from which it pulls a lot of info from Ohloh about the project - some of which is now on https://github.com/redecentralize/alternative-internet/blob/master/README.md

I'm going to change the column ordering, and perhaps move the links out into a separate json key/val pair for each project. As good as the list is, I'd like to do more with it perhaps using gh-pages (is there an open hosted alternative out there) but also keeping the current view available. In particular I'd like to be able to filter on projects that are looking for help, or open to contributions, by language, by activity etc.

[jnv]

Some of the projects are not listed on Ohloh, but they are hosted on GitHub which provides similar information, like list of languages or number of contributors.

Also, the current JSON is a bit unfriendly for human editing. I understand that files are edited through an automated process, but maybe YAML could be used instead or even a Markdown files with Jekyll-esque YAML frontmatter? (Markdown/Frontmatter has an additional advantage of being formatted on GitHub.)

[rossjones]

I agree. Makes total sense. I don't think conversion from JSON to yaml/md would be too onerous (given that not all of the generated JSON is required), and it should be possible to dramatically simplify the update script especially if we don't need sorting.

Perhaps we can do two things:

1. Generate the original list with a little bit of extra metadata, both from ohloh and github.
2. Pull it into redecentralize.org as well so presentation can be a little nicer.

Totally open to contributions and/or some way of finding more hours in my day :)