A couple of years ago it became known that a group of enthusiasts is developing a P2P browser with support for the Hypercore protocol. This browser is called Beaker 1.0. The goal of the project is to provide an opportunity for users to develop and host their sites not somewhere out there, but โright in the browserโ. That is, you can create a local folder and share a URL that will allow third-party users to access the new resource.
The network nodes in this case are the browser users themselves. Beaker is JavaScript based using the Chromium engine and Electron platform. Distributed by Beaker under the MIT license. The developers have prepared assemblies for Linux, macOS and Windows.
And what kind of protocol is this - Hypercore?
This is a very convenient technology that combines two more technologies - blockchain and BitTorrent. As mentioned above, users can upload site files and participate in their distribution. But the difference from BitTorrent is the ability to change files without creating a new address.
To create your own site, you just need to prepare the code, deploy the Hyperdrive environment and link to it. The resource is accessed using the "hyper: //" URL. As soon as the link is opened, the content is downloaded from the author's system - and immediately after downloading the files, a new user can become a new node in the distribution system.
The basis of the protocol is a log, which is available only for adding new data. It does not allow changes to information already added. These logs can be distributed among the participants in the network in P2P mode. In this case, each node can download only the fragments of interest from the log and then participate in their distribution.
The integrity of the log is checked using the structure "Merkle Tree" (Merkle Tree). In this case, each branch verifies all branches and nodes that are below. This verification was made possible thanks to the BLAKE2b-256 hash function.
How to create websites?
The browser already has everything you need. It is a code editor and tools for synchronizing directories with site content. There is also a web terminal and a specialized API for reading and downloading files. Terminal is a command shell for navigating the Hyperdrive environment.
The developers have provided for the possibility of linking several environments and merging them, creating forks and participating in the distribution of other users' environments.
In addition to creating sites independent of the hosting, the browser is also used for private data exchange, training in web programming, testing site prototypes and simplifying interaction in web development teams.
