Hemera Network as a cooperative aims to provide digital autonomy. When you're using a digital product like Google Drive, iCloud, or Zoom you're dependent on a company that is not interested in providing support to you as an individual or organization, you're primarily dependent on a company that will seek out the most profitable solution that usually includes violation of the privacy of your data.
- Obfuscation of source code, you have no way of knowing how your data is being used and if any company is appropriately managing your data all disguised in the idea of security or IP management.
- Infringing upon your privacy, Google Drive actively scans private files to, in their words, protect against abuse on their platform. This is just a single example of how a company can spin the idea of helping you while selling out your private information.
- Price gouging, extracting as much money as possible from their users per month to access features that ultimately require very little computational resources usually explained as setting a "market rate" for a given resource or service and involve locking basic features behind a paywall to incentivize upselling.
### Our solution
We present a solution that involves providing resources to individuals or groups interested in running private clouds for anyone. As an individual, business, or organization who wants or needs resources you can write up what you need and what you will use those resources for, directly connecting you with people who are interested in providing mutual aid.
## Distributed Computing for All
The need for scalable, robust, and efficient computing solutions is undeniable. Hemera Network aims to make this more accessible for the average user, combining technologies developed both by Netmaker and by their alternatives, ZeroTier, OpenZiti, etc. We can create guides that are easy to pickup by novice Linux/Windows users.
Getting full or partial adoption with tools recommended and supported by Hemera we can provide an avenue for anyone to spin up a node on public or private networks, providing infrastructure for those around them or for their own personal cloud.
## Introducing Netmaker
At the core of Hemera Network lies Netmaker, a platform that seamlessly connects computers, devices, and servers to create a unified, distributed network. Netmaker makes use of TURN (Traversal Using Relays around NAT) based communication, this means that nodes can be behind a single or double NAT.
> Any device connected by mobile data is likely behind a double NAT, your home computer/server may not be.
**Why Netmaker:**
Netmaker is used for how fast it is compared to alternatives based on synthetic benchmarks, ~15x faster than Nebula, ~5x faster than TailScale. That being said, dependence on a single technology or company is contrary to the goal of Hemera Network, so we also expect to branch out in the future especially for nodes that require a relay server.
> Relays help servers connect to distributed networks using a relay that is privately accessible as a proxy for data instead of attempting to rely on Wireguard for older computers.
> **Netmaker visualization in a testing environment, red represents blocked connections and gray lines represent active P2P connections.** Personal info and names have been redacted for privacy.
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> - Points connected by a single line are "clients" these are external devices like desktops or mobile phones that can request access to private sections of the network
> - Points connected by multiple lines are "hosts" these are servers that provide for the network or work as proxies for applications
> - Think running your own file sharing and collaboration platform that has a version accessible by a client and a version accessible by a domain using a public proxy host.
## Real-World Applications
**Let's take a quick look at some real world applications.**
#### Personal Cloud for Backups & Apps
Effortlessly manage offsite backups and personal applications while ensuring data security. Hemera Network uses tools based on Wireguard, this means that you can easily restrict access to any service or storage pool to a set of keys or to specific servers.
> Say a video editor doesn't want to store their older content directly on their machine, or they're on the go, they can clone all their data onto a node owner's Nextcloud and access it anywhere. The node owner could also communicate with other nodes to see if they would be willing to store a certain number of backups.
#### Private VPCs for Business or Organizations (Virtual Private Cloud)
Create a secure, isolated network environment between your servers with public IPs and dedicated offsite servers. Ideal for businesses or organizations needing strict access control and data isolation.
#### DDoS Protection for Servers
Defend your host server from DDoS attacks by proxying requests through a public server with robust DDoS protection. Enhance security and ensure service availability.
> Host multiple instances of a website and push updates to all at the same time then proxy their requests through a hardened server that can test latency of each webserver and choose the best for the user while diverting DDoS traffic.
#### Secure Internal Communication with WireGuard
Establish secure internal communication channels using WireGuard VPN. Run services like Matrix and Quiet over a tunneled connection to replicate the functionality of Zoom or slack without compromising your data.
## Offering Support
One fascinating aspect of distributed computing is its potential for community-driven support. We want to allow individuals and groups to contribute their surplus computing resources to aid causes they care about. We'll provide actionable guidance on getting involved and making a meaningful impact through distributed computing initiatives.
This includes:
- RSS feeds that allow node owners to see a list of active requests for resources.
- Public facing websites about organizations and their needs to open up avenues for support.
- Guidance both with documentation and connecting node owners for active communication.
- Both IRC and Matrix are currently in mind for accessible communication platforms.
## What to Expect Next
Here's a sneak peek of what's coming up:
1.**Getting Started:** We'll provide a straightforward guide to kickstart your journey with Netmaker, ZeroTier, or Headscale complete with screenshots and detailed instructions.
2.**The Technical Side:** Dive into the inner workings of our distributed computing platform, gaining insights into how it orchestrates and connects computers in a distributed environment. Use this resource if you want to eventually contribute to the project.
3.**Best Practices:** Explore tips, tricks, and proven practices for optimizing your distributed computing setup to ensure scalability and reliability.
## Confused about anything? Get in contact or review this quick guide
- Tunneling: Creating a secure, direct connection between two computers over an untrusted network, allowing data to travel safely between them.
- Proxying: Using an intermediary server to request resources or services on behalf of a client, often for security, performance, or anonymity.
- Pushing (in Git): Uploading your local code changes to a shared Git repository, making them available for others to access and collaborate on.
- Distributed Computing: A way of solving complex problems by breaking them into smaller tasks and having multiple computers work together to solve them, often making tasks faster and more reliable.
- IoT (Internet of Things): A network of everyday objects like smart thermostats, fitness trackers, and home appliances that can connect to the internet and share data to make our lives more convenient, in some cases.
- Load Balancing: The practice of distributing incoming workloads or data evenly across multiple computers or servers to prevent overloading any single one, ensuring smooth and efficient operation.
- Container Orchestration: A method of managing and automating the deployment, scaling, and operation of software containers (small, standalone packages of software) across multiple computers or servers.
- Edge Computing: The process of processing data closer to where it's generated (usually on devices or servers at the "edge" of a network) instead of sending it to a centralized data center, reducing latency and improving response times.
- Mutual Aid: The idea of individuals or organizations offering their extra computing resources (like spare processing power or storage) to help others with tasks or projects, often without expecting anything in return.
- Optimizing: Making something work better or more efficiently by fine-tuning it or adjusting its settings, usually to achieve better performance or resource utilization.
- Scalability: The ability of a system or network to handle growing amounts of work, data, or users without a significant drop in performance or reliability.
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