
™
‘
                  IPFS -- Inter-Planetary File system

IPFS is a global, versioned, peer-to-peer filesystem. It combines good ideas
from Git, BitTorrent, Kademlia, SFS, and the Web. It is like a single bit-
torrent swarm, exchanging git objects. IPFS provides an interface as simple
as the HTTP web, but with permanence built-in. You can also mount the world
at /ipfs.

IPFS is a protocol:
- defines a content-addressed file system
- coordinates content delivery
- combines Kademlia + BitTorrent + Git

IPFS is a filesystem:
- has directories and files
- mountable filesystem (via FUSE)

IPFS is a web:
- can be used to view documents like the web
- files accessible via HTTP at `http://ipfs.io/<path>`
- browsers or extensions can learn to use `ipfs://` directly
- hash-addressed content guarantees the authenticity

IPFS is modular:
- connection layer over any network protocol
- routing layer
- uses a routing layer DHT (kademlia/coral)
- uses a path-based naming service
- uses BitTorrent-inspired block exchange

IPFS uses crypto:
- cryptographic-hash content addressing
- block-level deduplication
- file integrity + versioning
- filesystem-level encryption + signing support

IPFS is p2p:
- worldwide peer-to-peer file transfers
- completely decentralized architecture
- **no** central point of failure

IPFS is a CDN:
- add a file to the filesystem locally, and it's now available to the world
- caching-friendly (content-hash naming)
- BitTorrent-based bandwidth distribution

IPFS has a name service:
- IPNS, an SFS inspired name system
- global namespace based on PKI
- serves to build trust chains
- compatible with other NSes
- can map DNS, .onion, .bit, etc to IPNS
‘
