Welcome crypto dummies!
If you’re new here, this substack focuses on educating those who know nothing about crypto and blockchain technology.
If that’s you then you’ve come to the right place!
We cover many different blockchain-related projects here, the juggernauts BTC and ETH, today our focus is on IPFS.
What is IPFS?
Interplanetary File System, or IPFS, is a peer-to-peer network and protocol for storing and sharing files, websites, applications, and data in a distributed file system.
What does this mean exactly?
A distributed file system is quite literally what it sounds like, it’s a file system that is distributed among multiple file servers or multiple locations. This allows you to access or store isolated files just like you would with local ones.
IPFS aims to address the decentralized data storage problem.
IPFS can find the information you’re looking for based on its contents and not its location.
Instead of scouring through Wikipedia for information related to bats, using IPFS, your computer will ask thousands of computers around the world to share any information related to bats with you.
Using IPFS you can download and distribute files. Not only do you have files, apps, websites, and data available to you from computers across the world, but, by using IPF you also help distribute those resources.
To give a bit of a better understanding of how this peer-to-peer decentralized distribution system works, here’s an excerpt from the IPFS official documentation.
While there's lots of complex technology in IPFS, the fundamental ideas are about changing how networks of people and computers communicate. Today's World Wide Web is structured on ownership and access, meaning that you get files from whoever owns them — if they choose to grant you access. IPFS is based on the ideas of possession and participation, where many people possess each others' files and participate in making them available.
That means IPFS only works well when people are actively participating. If you use your computer to share files using IPFS, but then you turn your computer off, other people won't be able to get those files from you anymore. But if you or others make sure that copies of those files are stored on more than one computer that's powered on and running IPFS, those files will be more reliably available to other IPFS users who want them. This happens to some extent automatically: by default, your computer shares a file with others for a limited time after you've downloaded it using IPFS. You can also make content available more permanently by pinning it, which saves it to your computer and makes it available on the IPFS network until you decide to unpin it.
ipfs.io
Note: Feel free to check out the official documentation below for a more in-depth understanding.
I know a little bit about IPFS now, but how exactly does it work?
Interplanetary file system works with content-based identifiers (or CIDs) that serve as a secure hash for contents and as a file location identifier.
Content addressing is used to identify the content based on what’s in it rather than where it’s located. This content is then linked via a Merkle DAG.
Wait, what’s a Merkle DAG?
A Merkle DAG (Directed Acyclic Graph) refers to a version-based organization of files.
Each node has a unique identifier that is a hash of the contents stored on the node. (This is a similar concept to the GitHub version control system.)
IPFS uses a Merkle DAG to represent directories and files. To build a Merkle DAG representation of your files, IPFS splits the content into blocks.
By splitting your content into blocks, different parts of the file can come from various sources and can be authenticated quickly.
The key idea is this: If you want to download a file, instead of fetching the file from one resource you can fetch this from multiple resources at once.
Okay, I think I’m getting it, but how do I know which peers have the content I’m looking for?
This is done through the use of a DHT (distributed hash table). We know that a hash table is a set of keys and their values, a distributed hash table is dispersed across all members of the network.
When you’ve found the blocks of data that you’re looking for, you can revert to the DHT to find the location your data is stored on.
I found the content I’m looking for, but how do I get it?
To send and receive the data you’re looking for, IPFS implemented Bitswap.
Bitswap allows users to connect to peers that have the data they’re looking for. You request the data you want/need, peers will then send you the data and you can verify the content by hashing to get the CID and compare it to the CID you requested.
Let’s zoom out and take a look at the architecture behind how IPFS operates.
Wrapping it all up
IPFS aims to solve the decentralized data storage problem by introducing a storage network where peers can share data from across the globe. Data is carefully organized and identified by its content rather than its location.
This decentralized model makes it possible to download a file from many locations that aren’t directly managed by one singular organization. Bringing new meaning to decentralized data storage.
Quick market update for crypto dummies
If you’re still reading this, odds are you’re fairly new to crypto. (That’s okay! We’re here to help with that.)
If you’re just getting started or exploring the world of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology, it’s easy to get discouraged by the current market conditions.
One thing to keep in mind is that is still a fairly new technology that is now receiving some of the recognition it deserves.
Market conditions aside, blockchain technology holds the key to drastically changing and improving the world as we know it.
Find projects you believe in, do your research, and learn about the technology first.
NOT FINANCIAL ADVICE.
That’s all for today crypto dummiez! Stay tuned next week and we’ll dive a little bit deeper into IPFS with Part 2.