[liberationtech] ANNOUNCING Tahoe, the Least-Authority File System, v1.8.2

Wed Feb 2 07:28:09 PST 2011

This sounds great. Thanks for sharing. 
As a non-techie I would love to know what others on the list think of it.

Cheers,
Rebecca

On Feb 2, 2011, at 10:04 AM, Zooko O'Whielacronx wrote:

> ANNOUNCING Tahoe, the Least-Authority File System, v1.8.2
> 
> The Tahoe-LAFS team is pleased to announce the immediate
> availability of version 1.8.2 of Tahoe-LAFS, an extremely
> reliable distributed storage system. Get it here:
> 
> http://tahoe-lafs.org/source/tahoe/trunk/docs/quickstart.html
> 
> Tahoe-LAFS is the first distributed storage system to offer
> "provider-independent security" — meaning that not even the
> operators of your storage servers can read or alter your data
> without your consent. Here is the one-page explanation of its
> unique security and fault-tolerance properties:
> 
> http://tahoe-lafs.org/source/tahoe/trunk/docs/about.html
> 
> The previous stable release of Tahoe-LAFS was v1.8.1, which was
> released October 28, 2010 [1].
> 
> v1.8.2 is a stable bugfix release, adding compatibility with
> the recently-released Twisted-10.2, and correcting a number of
> minor issues. See the NEWS file [2] for details.
> 
> 
> WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR?
> 
> With Tahoe-LAFS, you distribute your filesystem across
> multiple servers, and even if some of the servers fail or are
> taken over by an attacker, the entire filesystem continues to
> work correctly, and continues to preserve your privacy and
> security. You can easily share specific files and directories
> with other people.
> 
> In addition to the core storage system itself, volunteers
> have built other projects on top of Tahoe-LAFS and have
> integrated Tahoe-LAFS with existing systems, including
> Windows, JavaScript, iPhone, Android, Hadoop, Flume, Django,
> Puppet, bzr, mercurial, perforce, duplicity, TiddlyWiki, and
> more. See the Related Projects page on the wiki [3].
> 
> We believe that strong cryptography, Free and Open Source
> Software, erasure coding, and principled engineering practices
> make Tahoe-LAFS safer than RAID, removable drive, tape,
> on-line backup or cloud storage.
> 
> This software is developed under test-driven development, and
> there are no known bugs or security flaws which would
> compromise confidentiality or data integrity under recommended
> use. (For all important issues that we are currently aware of
> please see the known_issues.rst file [4].)
> 
> 
> COMPATIBILITY
> 
> This release is compatible with the version 1 series of
> Tahoe-LAFS. Clients from this release can write files and
> directories in the format used by clients of all versions back
> to v1.0 (which was released March 25, 2008). Clients from this
> release can read files and directories produced by clients of
> all versions since v1.0. Servers from this release can serve
> clients of all versions back to v1.0 and clients from this
> release can use servers of all versions back to v1.0.
> 
> This is the thirteenth release in the version 1 series. This
> series of Tahoe-LAFS will be actively supported and maintained
> for the forseeable future, and future versions of Tahoe-LAFS
> will retain the ability to read and write files compatible
> with this series.
> 
> 
> LICENCE
> 
> You may use this package under the GNU General Public License,
> version 2 or, at your option, any later version. See the file
> "COPYING.GPL" [5] for the terms of the GNU General Public
> License, version 2.
> 
> You may use this package under the Transitive Grace Period
> Public Licence, version 1 or, at your option, any later
> version. (The Transitive Grace Period Public Licence has
> requirements similar to the GPL except that it allows you to
> delay for up to twelve months after you redistribute a derived
> work before releasing the source code of your derived work.)
> See the file "COPYING.TGPPL.html" [6] for the terms of the
> Transitive Grace Period Public Licence, version 1.
> 
> (You may choose to use this package under the terms of either
> licence, at your option.)
> 
> 
> INSTALLATION
> 
> Tahoe-LAFS works on Linux, Mac OS X, Windows, Cygwin, Solaris,
> *BSD, and probably most other systems. Start with
> "docs/quickstart.html" [7].
> 
> 
> HACKING AND COMMUNITY
> 
> Please join us on the mailing list [8]. Patches are gratefully
> accepted -- the RoadMap page [9] shows the next improvements
> that we plan to make and CREDITS [10] lists the names of people
> who've contributed to the project. The Dev page [11] contains
> resources for hackers.
> 
> 
> SPONSORSHIP
> 
> Tahoe-LAFS was originally developed by Allmydata, Inc., a
> provider of commercial backup services. After discontinuing
> funding of Tahoe-LAFS R&D in early 2009, they continued
> to provide servers, bandwidth, small personal gifts as tokens
> of appreciation, and bug reports.
> 
> Google, Inc. sponsored Tahoe-LAFS development as part of the
> Google Summer of Code 2010. They awarded four sponsorships to
> students from around the world to hack on Tahoe-LAFS that
> summer.
> 
> Thank you to Allmydata and Google for their generous and
> public-spirited support.
> 
> 
> HACK TAHOE-LAFS!
> 
> If you can find a security flaw in Tahoe-LAFS which is serious
> enough that we feel compelled to warn our users and issue a fix,
> then we will award you with a customized t-shirts with your
> exploit printed on it and add you to the "Hack Tahoe-LAFS Hall
> Of Fame" [12].
> 
> 
> ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
> 
> This is the seventh release of Tahoe-LAFS to be created solely
> as a labor of love by volunteers. Thank you very much to the
> team of "hackers in the public interest" who make Tahoe-LAFS
> possible.
> 
> Brian Warner
> on behalf of the Tahoe-LAFS team
> 
> January 30, 2011
> San Francisco, California, USA
> 
> 
> [1] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/browser/relnotes.txt?rev=4865
> [2] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/browser/NEWS?rev=5000
> [3] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/wiki/RelatedProjects
> [4] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/browser/docs/known_issues.rst
> [5] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/browser/COPYING.GPL
> [6] http://tahoe-lafs.org/source/tahoe/trunk/COPYING.TGPPL.html
> [7] http://tahoe-lafs.org/source/tahoe/trunk/docs/quickstart.html
> [8] http://tahoe-lafs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tahoe-dev
> [9] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/roadmap
> [10] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/browser/CREDITS?rev=5000
> [11] http://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe/wiki/Dev
> [12] http://tahoe-lafs.org/hacktahoelafs/
> _______________________________________________
> liberationtech mailing list
> liberationtech at lists.stanford.edu
> 
> Should you need to change your subscription options, please go to:
> 
> https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/liberationtech
> 
> If you would like to receive a daily digest, click "yes" (once you click above) next to "would you like to receive list mail batched in a daily digest?"
> 
> You will need the user name and password you receive from the list moderator in monthly reminders.
> 
> Should you need immediate assistance, please contact the list moderator.
> 
> Please don't forget to follow us on http://twitter.com/#!/Liberationtech