Set up
Follow the instructions on the IPFS install page.
For UNIX systems, you will need to download an archive file, and run a script in it:
# mac only
curl https://dist.ipfs.io/go-ipfs/v0.4.21/go-ipfs_v0.4.21_darwin-amd64.tar.gz > go-ipfs.tar.gz
# linux only
curl https://dist.ipfs.io/go-ipfs/v0.4.21/go-ipfs_v0.4.21_linux-arm64.tar.gz > go-ipfs.tar.gz
# both
tar xvfz go-ipfs.tar.gz
cd go-ipfs
./install.shFor Windows, you will need to download an archive file,
and put the ipfs.exe file somewhere on your %PATH%.
Run your own node
Check to see if this file has already been created:
cat ~/.ipfs/configIf it does not exist, you will need to initialise your IPFS:
ipfs initNow you are ready to run your own node:
ipfs daemonYou should see some output that looks similar to:
Initializing daemon...
go-ipfs version: 0.4.21-
Repo version: 7
System version: amd64/darwin
Golang version: go1.12.5
Swarm listening on /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/4001
Swarm listening on /ip4/192.168.1.172/tcp/4001
Swarm listening on /ip6/::1/tcp/4001
Swarm listening on /ip6/fd73:d6f5:6ad3:0:4f4:4464:3636:222c/tcp/4001
Swarm listening on /ip6/fd73:d6f5:6ad3:0:6df6:32ee:4638:462a/tcp/4001
Swarm listening on /p2p-circuit
Swarm announcing /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/4001
Swarm announcing /ip4/192.168.1.172/tcp/4001
Swarm announcing /ip6/::1/tcp/4001
Swarm announcing /ip6/fd73:d6f5:6ad3:0:4f4:4464:3636:222c/tcp/4001
Swarm announcing /ip6/fd73:d6f5:6ad3:0:6df6:32ee:4638:462a/tcp/4001
API server listening on /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/5001
WebUI: http://127.0.0.1:5001/webui
Gateway (readonly) server listening on /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/8080
Daemon is readyTake note of this line:
Gateway (readonly) server listening on /ip4/127.0.0.1/tcp/8080This means that your own local node for IPFS can be reached over HTTP at http://localhost:8080/
Try it out
Enter the following command:
ipfs config show | grep -i PeerIDYou should get output similar to:
"PeerID": "QmRNDN13tyVY9z7buHqJhuaN9ou9z6cf7wDJL6JuHVudDj"This is the ID of your own node - anyone else who knows this can talk to your node via IPFS!
Now let's write a file to IPFS:
echo "${USER} <3 DApps Dev Club" | ipfs addYou will get output similar to:
added QmQSBNDPDjQxo4skLoMK2V7ZpSkcLz2niGjAe6XjvL5SL7 QmQSBNDPDjQxo4skLoMK2V7ZpSkcLz2niGjAe6XjvL5SL7
24 B / 24 B [======================================================================================================================================================================]This is the ID of the file that you just uploaded to IPFS - anyone who knows this hash can download your file! Let's copy-and-paste that and set it as an environment variable in your terminal:
IPFS_HASH=QmQSBNDPDjQxo4skLoMK2V7ZpSkcLz2niGjAe6XjvL5SL7# get file from your local IPFS node, by talking to the API directly
$ ipfs cat ${IPFS_HASH}
bguiz <3 DApps Dev Club
# get file from your local IPFS node, over HTTP
$ curl http://127.0.0.1:8080/ipfs/${IPFS_HASH}
bguiz <3 DApps Dev ClubPeer to peer
IPFS is a peer-to-peer distributed file system - let's take a look at all the other nodes that your node is connected to, i.e. its peers:
ipfs swarm peersYou should see a small list of peers that your current IPFS node is connected to.
All of these other computers are also running their own instance of ipfs daemon!
Also, like any other peer-to-peer network, your own node tries to discover more nodes on the network.
$ ipfs swarm peers | wc -l
27
# ... wait for a few minutes...
$ ipfs swarm peers | wc -l
41Now if there are several of you connected to the same local area network, either wireless or wired, you should be able to discover each others nodes, assuming that there's no firewall on the network that is configured to impede this. However, this peer discovery is eventual - it does not occur automatically upon starting, and can take a while.
In order to "force" your IPFS node to connect to another known IPFS node,
you will need to somehow obtain its IP address, and PeerID.
You can obtain this by running:
ipfs idIn the output, copy any of the lines that does not begin with:
/ip4/127.0.0.1/ip6/::1
(These addresses are normally only accessible from you own computer)
Then on a different computer, enter the following, replacing the ${ADDRESS} string with the one that you just copied:
ipfs swarm connect ${ADDRESS}Note that this does not guarantee that your IPFS node will connect to the one that you have specified, but it does make it likely that it will connect to this one faster than it would have taken by default. If the current IPFS node does succeed in connecting to the other IPFS node, you will see output similar to the following:
$ ipfs swarm connect /ip4/123.123.21.43/tcp/4001/ipfs/QmWtjovndrUkjUWgHpzSPfyrEqNo3LGAD1WniPSZH4N4kU
connect QmWtjovndrUkjUWgHpzSPfyrEqNo3LGAD1WniPSZH4N4kU success