By Freenet Contributors

Freenet 0.7.5 build 1494 is now available.

Install Freenet for Windows, for GNU/Linux and other *nixes, or for Android. See the download page for more information and other platforms.

This build improves six broad areas:

  • streaming on demand,
  • configuration,
  • security,
  • windows installer and tray,
  • the debian package, and
  • tools.

Streaming Audio and Video on Demand

Streaming provides improved video and audio:

  • Video sizes are more robust when the size changes between subsequent videos.
  • Audio tags no longer try to display the overlay.

This finally enables convenient Samizdat Radio.

Configuration

To help modernize the configuration of existing nodes, Freenet now shows a user alert once every Freenet update if the datastore is below 10% of available space with a link to the store size wizard page to make it easy to increase the store. Thanks to Trivuele!

Also the bandwidth settings now parse the bit suffix correctly (lowercase b in kbps is bit, not byte).

Security

Freenet received improvements to security both for friend to friend mode, for opennet, and to tools for Freesites.

Friend-to-Friend mode now randomizes pitch black defense times and waits at least 12 hours between pitch black mitigations to prevent timing attacks.

Opennet is hardened by disabling the write local to datastore functionality when opennet is enabled; it can be useful on a small darknet, but on opennet it makes it easier to find downloaders. Thanks to Trivuele!

Also a FOAF mitigation was fixed. It wasn't operational before, because it lacked a conversion to percent. Thanks to freedom-of-depression!

The /imagecreator/ tool, among other changes, now ensures that requested image sizes are sane — thanks to Oleh from Redwerk

Finally it’s now easier to build fred without network access. Thanks to Trivuele!

Bugfixes

In addition to these improvements, bugs got fixed:

  • fix build with modern Java: add opens jvmargs on java 17.
  • remove Frost on ChatForumsToadlet from non-updated translations (removed 2019 from the original english).
  • fix parts of the German translation.
  • Do not store blocks in the cache, if they are eligible for the store (should increase usable cache size). Thanks to Trivuele!

Windows Installer and Tray

The windows installer and tray application much more robust detection of the installed Java — thanks to naejadu.

The windows installer and the tray application now detect Java on your path, and the installer only prompts installing Java if there is none yet. The installer also installs a clean adoptium Java 11, almost halving the installer size.

And the tray toggles additional arguments depending on your Java version to keep Freenet working when Java is updated to version 16 or later.

Debian Package

Thanks to DC*, who also ported Freenet to Android, There is finally a Debian package available. It still needs testing.

If you run Debian or a distribution based on Debian, or can help get the package included in Debian, please heed the call for beta-testers!

$ curl -s
https://packagecloud.io/install/repositories/desyncr/freenet/script.deb.sh
| sudo bash
$ apt install freenet

(maybe read the script before you directly execute it like this)

The debian package accompanies our existing Gentoo-package which spearheaded packaging completely from source, and the Arch aur package.

Tools: media-site and freenetbrowser

Two new tools simplify publishing media in Freenet and using freenet with stronger protections.

  • Generate Media Site is a utility to create sites with streaming media on demand.
  • freenetbrowser auto-generates a separate browser-profile on GNU/Linux and can install a Freenet node with randomized IP and Port, preventing port detection (for example by unsafe local services).

After installing freenetbrowser (see the README), you can visit the example page for generate media site with:

freenetbrowser --install USK@rQnuHCVpf7BHcsZHBt911K3-iaELN1u1Vg0fzxDRq7k,I1vFYWONhGfECHr9XD-1lKxxstr64rF4dTykcMq9swY,AQACAAE/gms/11/

This provides a simple streaming setup and a handler for Freenet URIs. Your streaming site can look like this:

Hero, Blender Open Movie, screenshot
Hero, Blender Open Movie, The full shortfilm of Hero by the Blender Foundation. License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/; Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HERO_-_Blender_Open_Movie-full_movie.webm

A big thank you to all contributors and reviewers for getting this release in shape!

And thank you for using Freenet!

Contribute

If you want to help us get better, please chat with us in #freenet @ irc.libera.chat. And give us time to answer, we’re all volunteers and might not be in your timezone.

To get into development right-away, have a look at one of the Freenet-Projects or just get fred and fix something that annoys you.

And to take on something that makes a big difference, have a look at the high-impact tasks.

What is Freenet?

Freenet is a peer-to-peer platform for
censorship-resistant and privacy-respecting
publishing and communication.

I worry about my child and the Internet all the time, even though she's too young to have logged on yet. Here's what I worry about. I worry that 10 or 15 years from now, she will come to me and say 'Daddy, where were you when they took freedom of the press away from the Internet? --Mike Godwin, Electronic Frontier Foundation

That Freenet can keep moving forward and help people worldwide to exercise their basic rights and freedoms is the work of amazing volunteers, both contributors and people running Freenet nodes.

Thank you for your contributions, and thank you for using Freenet!

-- AB

Install Freenet for Windows, for GNU/Linux and other *nixes, or for Android. See the download page for more information and other platforms.

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