IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) is a communication protocol for creating a distributed file system designed to replace the existing Internet protocol HTTP. Content hosted on IPFS is stored on multiple nodes rather than on a single server.
IPFS is an important infrastructure solution for Web3, enabling distributed storage in several distributed applications, including NFT, GameFi, DeFi.
In the future, IPFS can completely change the way data is stored and accessed on the network, solving the problem of censorship and monopoly of popular cloud platforms provided by Google, Amazon, Alibaba, Microsoft and other tech giants.
How IPFS differs from HTTP
IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) is an open-source hypermedia communications protocol that allows computer nodes to store and share data in a single, distributed file system.
The main difference between IPFS and the existing Internet protocol, HTTP, is that access to data is not based on the location of the site, but directly on the address of its content (a file, document, image, folder).
What is IPFS in simple words
The data storage structure in IPFS is decentralized, which solves the problem of censorship. The author of the solution, Juan Benet, founder and director of the American startup Protocol Labs, called IPFS a “distributed persistent web,” referring to the fact that a site hosted in the system can never be closed by anyone.
“In a sense, IPFS is similar to the Internet, but IPFS can be thought of as a single BitTorrent swarm sharing objects in a single Git repository. In other words, IPFS represents a high-performance block storage model with content-addressable hyperlinks,”
he explains in the project’s white paper.
In IPFS, addresses point to files or data, and are derived from the content of the file or data itself using hashing. This implies that content from web sites that is hosted on the IPFS network can be relocated and retrieved within a P2P system as opposed to a single central location.
Simply put, the IPFS can be thought of as useful just like a torrent tracker, in the sense that a number of nodes/computers share files on their systems without any restrictions whatsoever, hence making the files available all over the network.
In this way, IPFS addresses the shortcomings of HTTP, which delivers all requests and all data through centralized servers which brings additional expenses and potential mass failures due to problems with servers. The IPFS network performs better since it does not require uploading of the files to several servers and limiting the transfers to only the HTTP system. In an IPFS network, the request for particular files is not sent to only one node, rather it is made to many nodes that hold the relevant hashes and the information is retrieved.
Who developed the IPFS and when was it developed?
The author of IPFS was Juan Benet, founder of the American company Protocol Labs. The technical documentation of the new file system was published in July 2014.
The first release of the protocol took place in February 2014. The first major site to use the IPFS distributed web in September 2015 was the free web hosting company Neocities, which allows the creation of mini-sites on its platform.
The next milestone in the history of IPFS development was the $257 million Filecoin ICO. The sale of tokens took place on the Coinlist platform, founded by Protocol Labs in partnership with AngelList. As the developers noted at the time, the goal of Filecoin was to create economic incentives for IPFS users with the cryptocurrency.
In June 2019, Protocol Labs organized the first IPFS event in Barcelona, which led to cooperation with Netflix, as well as with Opera, Microsoft, and Cloudflare.
Equally important was the launch of the main Filecoin network in October 2020. According to the Protocol Labs team, this created an IPFS adoption layer with built-in economic incentives.
How IPFS works – a detailed explanation
IPFS employs unique CIDs (content identifiers) that are entirely different from traditional web addresses, which would otherwise adopt a server address (usually an IP address) as the binding for accessing an object, file or user data within the IPFS system.
The oil paint has an upper level of drying, after it has been recessed into a layer of the cover. This is true, in particular, for any version of the document the versioning system is working with and this is also the main reason for the high level of nervousness when documents are lost.
For the IPNS, IPNS is usually exploited as a location in case there is need to call earlier versions of the object. The addressed audience usually prefers the chronology of the system, which includes people and or structures that have a gross knowledge of the document such as the number of times it has been called upon.
Files bigger than 256 kb stored within IPFS are dissected, then compressed and contained in hexdodecahedron shapes termed as InterPlanetary Linked Data (IPLD) objects. An IPLD object is constructed from two slices; the actual data, and relations which are constructed in the form of directed acyclic polytree termed as a merkle DAG (Directed-Acyclic Graph).
Then there comes into play a specific software, the IPFS Daemon that is responsible for this interaction. The client synchronizes the data either by storing it or by provision of contents to other requests and is not limited to one option and redistributing it to the other nodes on request. These nodes can then act as content providers or remain as content recipients.
After making a call for content from the system’s Distributed Hash Table (DHT), the users located nearest to the user who has the data being searched for are looked for. These are partial file providers.
How to open an IPFS link
Many popular browsers such as Opera and Brave have already added native support for IPFS links. This means that you will be able to open sites in these browsers via an address with the prefix ipfs://, for example:
ipfs://bafybeiaysi4s6lnjev27ln5icwm6tueaw2vdykrtjkwiphwekaywqhcjze/wiki/
However, this link will not open in Google Chrome. Instead, you will have to use the existing HTTPS protocol to access the resource along with the address of the site where the file is stored, for example:
https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafybeiaysi4s6lnjev27ln5icwm6tueaw2vdykrtjkwiphwekaywqhcjze/wiki/
To directly open IPFS links in Google Chrome, you need to install a special IPFS Companion extension. The developers recommend installing your own IPFS node on your computer for the extension to work correctly. To do this, go to the IPFS Desktop section of the official IPFS website and follow simple instructions, choosing the appropriate platform in advance: Windows, macOS or Ubuntu.
The Protocol Labs team also looks after the domain and site owners wishing to move their web assets to IPFS. A special download service is developed by Fleek which helps you move and set up websites without the need for software installation or any other actions that include using the command line or code.
