使用 Beaker 浏览器浏览对等 Web
浏览器 P2P 对等
![](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082745ztmi4kqh4iq449ll.jpg)


在过去 50 年中，我们所了解的互联网没有什么变化，全球的网民使用他们的设备从遍布在世界各地的服务器上检索数据。


一群专业的技术专家想改变现状，使互联网变成人们可以连接和直接分享信息的地方，而不是依赖一个中心服务器（去中心化）。


我们已经在 It’s FOSS 讨论过很多这样的去中心化的服务。[YouTube 竞品：LBRY](https://itsfoss.com/lbry/)、[Twitter 竞品：Mastodon](https://itsfoss.com/mastodon-open-source-alternative-twitter/) 是其中的两个例子。


今天我将要介绍另一个这样的产品，名为 [Beaker 浏览器](https://beakerbrowser.com/)，它的设计目标是浏览对等 Web。


![Beaker Browser](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/083036yeso1o0ok1o0n0o8.jpg)


### “对等 Web” 是什么？


根据 Beaker 浏览器的[开发者之一](https://pfrazee.hashbase.io/blog/what-is-the-p2p-web)的描述，“对等 Web 是一项实验性的技术 ……旨在提高我们掌控 Web 的能力。”


还有，他们说对等 Web 有三个主要原则：任何一点都可以成为服务器；多台计算机可以为同一个网站提供服务；没有后端。


从这些原则中你可以看出，对等 Web 的思想与 BitTorrent 很像，文件由多个对端做种，这些对端共同承担带宽负载。这减少了一个用户需要提供给他们的网站的总带宽。


![Beaker Browser Settings](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082813xskck3cc47b6zb2z.jpg)


对等 Web 另一个重要的方面是创作者对于他们自己的想法的控制能力。当今年代，平台都是由庞大的组织控制的，往往拿你的数据为他们所用。Beaker 把数据的控制能力返还给了内容创造者。


### 使用 Beaker 浏览去中心化的 web


[Beaker 浏览器](https://beakerbrowser.com/) 是在 2016 年被创建的。该项目（及其周边技术）由[蓝链实验室](https://bluelinklabs.com/)的三人团队创建。Beaker 浏览器使用 [Dat 协议](https://www.datprotocol.com/)在计算机之间共享数据。使用 Dat 协议的网站以 `dat://` 而不是 `http://` 开头。


Dat 协议的优势如下：


* 快速 – 档案能立即从多个源同步。
* 安全 – 所有的更新都是有签名和经过完整性检查的。
* 灵活 – 可以在不修改档案 URL 的情况下迁移主机。
* 版本控制 – 每次修改都被写到只能追加的版本日志中。
* 去中心化 – 任何设备都可以作为承载档案的主机。


![Beaker Browser Seeding](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082827y0qbju40lzp0j3to.jpg)


Beaker 浏览器本质上是阉割版的 Chromium，原生支持 `dat://` 地址，也可以访问普通的 `http://` 站点。


每次访问一个 dat 站点，在你请求时该站点的内容才会下载到你的计算机。例如，在一个站点上的 about 页面中有一张 Linux Torvalds 的图片，只有在你浏览到该站点的这个页面时，才会下载这张图片。


此外，当你浏览一个 dat 网站时，“[你会短暂性的](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/faq/)重新上传或做种你从该网站上下载的所有文件。”你也可以选择为网站（主动）做种来帮助创造者。


![Beaker Browser Menu](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082832j6dsizplps6ppwib.jpg)


由于 Beaker 的志向就是创建一个更开放的网络，因此你可以很容易地查看任何网站的源码。不像在大多数浏览器上你只能看到当前浏览的页面的源码那样，使用 Beaker 你能以类似 GitHub 的视图查看整个站点的结构。你甚至可以复刻这个站点，并托管你自己的版本。


除了浏览基于 dat 的网站外，你还可以创建自己的站点。在 Beaker 浏览器的菜单里，有创建新网站或空项目的选项。如果你选择了创建一个新网站，Beaker 会搭建一个小的演示站点，你可以使用浏览器里自带的编辑器来编辑。


然而，如果你像我一样更喜欢用 Markdown，你可以选择创建一个空项目。Beaker 会创建一个站点的结构，赋给它一个 `dat://` 地址。你只需要创建一个 `index.md` 文件后就行了。这有个[简短教程](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/create-a-markdown-site)，你可以看到更多信息。你也可以用创建空项目的方式搭建一个 web 应用。


![Beaker Browser Website Template](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082833du6hzqquqoqu2xr6.jpg)


由于 Beaker 的角色是个 Web 服务器和站点做种者，当你关闭它或关机后你的站点就不可用了。幸运的是，你不必一直开着你的计算机或浏览器。你也可以使用名为 [Hashbase](https://hashbase.io/) 的做种服务或者你可以搭建一个 [homebase](https://github.com/beakerbrowser/homebase) 做种服务器。


虽然 Beaker [适用于](https://beakerbrowser.com/install/) Linux、Windows 和 macOS，但是在使用 Beaker 之前，还是要查阅下[各平台的教程](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/)。


### Beaker 浏览器不是大众可用的，但它有这个意图


当第一次接触到时，我对 Beaker 浏览器有极高的热情。（但是）如它现在的名字一样（烧杯），Beaker 浏览器仍是非常实验性的。我尝试浏览过的很多 dat 站点还不可用，因为用户并没有为站点做种。当站点恢复可用时 Beaker 确实可以选择通知你。


![Beaker Browser No Peer](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/082904jl72aa42av4jy2cg.jpg)


另一个问题是，Beaker 是真正阉割版的 Chromium。它不能安装扩展或主题。你只能使用白色主题和极少的工具集。我不会把 Beaker 浏览器作为常用浏览器，而且能访问 dat 网站并不是把它留在系统上的充分条件。


我曾经寻找一个能支持 `dat://` 协议的 Firefox 扩展。我确实找到了这样一款扩展，但它需要安装一系列其他的软件。相比而言，安装 Beaker 比安装那些软件容易点。


就如它现在的名字一样，Beaker 不适合我。也许在将来更多的人使用 Beaker 或者其他浏览器支持 dat 协议。那时会很有趣。目前而言，聊胜于无。


在使用 Beaker 的时间里，我用内建的工具创建了一个[网站](https://41bfbd06731e8d9c5d5676e8145069c69b254e7a3b710ddda4f6e9804529690c/)。不要担心，我已经为它做种了。


![Beaker Bowser Site Source](/data/attachment/album/202005/10/083011dzyaocy5qlqel34o.jpg)


你怎么看 Beaker 浏览器？你怎么看对等 Web？请尽情在下面评论。


如果你觉得本文有意思，请花点时间把它分享到社交媒体，Hacker News 或 [Reddit](https://reddit.com/r/linuxusersgroup)。




---


via: <https://itsfoss.com/beaker-browser/>


作者：[John Paul](https://itsfoss.com/author/john/) 选题：[lujun9972](https://github.com/lujun9972) 译者：[lxbwolf](https://github.com/lxbwolf) 校对：[wxy](https://github.com/wxy)


本文由 [LCTT](https://github.com/LCTT/TranslateProject) 原创编译，[Linux中国](https://linux.cn/) 荣誉推出


OK
The Internet as we know it has existed unchanged (more or less) for the last 50 years. People across the globe use their devices to retrieve data from huge servers dotted around the world.

A group of dedicated technologists wants to change that to make the internet a place where people can connect and share information directly instead of relying on a central server (decentralization).

There are a bunch of such decentralized services that we have already covered on It’s FOSS. [LBRY as YouTube alternative](https://itsfoss.com/lbry/), [Mastodon as Twitter alternative](https://itsfoss.com/mastodon-open-source-alternative-twitter/) are just a couple of such examples.

And today I am going to cover another such product called [Beaker Browser](https://beakerbrowser.com/) which is essentially for browsing the peer to peer web.

![Beaker Browser](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-browser-800x426.jpg)

## What is the ‘peer-to-peer Web’?

According to [one of the devs](https://pfrazee.hashbase.io/blog/what-is-the-p2p-web) behind the Beaker browser, “The P2P Web is an experimental set of technologies…to give users more control over the Web.”

Further, they say that the peer-to-peer Web has three main principles: anybody can be a server; multiple computers can serve the same site; there is no back end.

As you can see from those principles. the idea of the peer-to-peer Web is very similar to BitTorrent where files are seeded by multiple peers and those peers share the bandwidth load. This reduces the overall bandwidth that a person needs to provide for their site.

![Beaker Bowser Setting](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-bowser-setting-800x573.jpg)

The other major part of the peer-to-peer Web is creator control of their ideas. In this day and age, platforms being controlled by large corporations, who try to use your data for their benefit. Beaker returns control to the content creators.

## Browsing the decentralized web with Beaker

The [Beaker Browser](https://beakerbrowser.com/) first came into existence in 2016. The project (and the technology that surrounds it) is created by a team of three at [Blue Link Labs](https://bluelinklabs.com/). The Beaker Browser uses the [Dat protocol](https://www.datprotocol.com/) to share data between computers. All websites that use the Dat protocol start with `dat://`

instead of `http://`

.

The strengths of the Dat protocol are:

- Fast – Archives sync from multiple sources at once.
- Secure – All updates are signed and integrity-checked.
- Resilient – Archives can change hosts without changing their URLs.
- Versioned – Changes are written to an append-only version log.
- Decentralized – Any device can host any archive.

![Beaker Browser Seeding](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-bowser-seedding-800x466.jpg)

The Beaker Browser is essentially a cut down version of Chromium with built-in support for `dat://`

addresses. It can still visit regular `http://`

sites.

Each time you visit a dat site, the content for that site is downloaded to your computer as you request it. For example, a picture of Linux Torvalds on the about page of a site is not downloaded until you navigate to that page.

Also, once you visit a dat website, “[you temporarily](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/faq/) re-upload or seed whichever files you’ve downloaded from the website.” You can also choose to seed the website to help its creator.

![Beaker Browser Menu](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-browser-menu.jpg)

Since the whole idea of Beaker is to create a more open web, you can easily view the source of any website. Unlike most browsers where you just see the source code the current page, you are viewing, Beaker shows you the entire structure of the site in a GitHub-like view. You can even fork the site and host your version of it.

Besides visiting dat-based websites, you can also create your own site. In the Beaker Browser menu, there is an option to create a new website or an empty project. If you select the option to create a new website, Beaker will build a little demo site that you can edit with the browser’s built-in editor.

However, if you are like me and prefer to use Markdown, you can choose to create an empty project. Beaker will create the structure of a site and assign it a `dat://`

address. Create an `index.md`

file and you are good to go. There is a [short tutorial](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/create-a-markdown-site) with more info. You can also use the create empty project option to build a web app.

![Beaker Browser Website Template](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-browser-website-template-800x459.jpg)

Since Beaker acts as a web server and site seeder, any time you close it or turn off your computer your site will become unavailable. Thankfully, you don’t have to run your computer or the browser constantly. You can also use a seeding service named [Hashbase](https://hashbase.io/) or you can set up a [ homebase](https://github.com/beakerbrowser/homebase) seeding server.

Though Beaker is [available](https://beakerbrowser.com/install/) for Linux, Windows, and macOS. If you do start playing around Beaker, be sure to take a quick look at [their gui](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/)[d](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/)[es](https://beakerbrowser.com/docs/guides/).

## Beaker Browser is not for everyone but it has a purpose

When I first got this assignment, I had high hopes for the Beaker Browser. As it stands now, it’s still very experimental. A number of the dat sites that I tried to visit were unavailable because the user was not seeding their site. Beaker does have an option to notify you when that site is back online.

![Beaker Browser No Peer](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-browser-no-peer-800x424.jpg)

Another problem is that Beaker is a really stripped down version of Chromium. There is no option to install extensions or themes. Instead, you are stuck with a white theme and a very limited toolset. I would not use this as my main browser and having access to the world of dat websites is not enough of a reason to keep it installed on my system.

I looked to see if there is an extension for Firefox that would add support for the `dat://`

protocol. I did find such an extension, but it also required the installation of a couple of other pieces of software. It’s just easier to install Beaker.

As it stands now, Beaker is not for me. Maybe in the future, more people will start using Beaker or the dat protocol will gain support by other browsers. Then it might be interesting. Right now, it’s kinda empty.

As part of my time with Beaker, I created a [website](//41bfbd06731e8d9c5d5676e8145069c69b254e7a3b710ddda4f6e9804529690c/) using the built-in tools. Don’t worry, I made sure that it’s seeded.

![Beaker Bowser Site Source](https://itsfoss.com/content/images/wordpress/2020/04/beaker-bowser-source-800x544.jpg)

What are your thoughts on the Beaker Brower? What are your thoughts on the peer-to-peer web? Please let us know in the comments below.

If you found this article interesting, please take a minute to share it on social media, Hacker News, or [Reddit](http://reddit.com/r/linuxusersgroup).