[Galene] Command-line client for Galene file transfer

[Galene] Command-line client for Galene file transfer

[Juliusz Chroboczek]

Hi,

Real Men (and Real Women) don't use webapps for transferring files.  They
set up their own ssh server on the VAX in their basement, and teach their
friends to use rsync.  (They also don't use webapps for conferencing, they
set up C News and teach their friends to use slrn.)

Sometimes, however, even we need something that's a little easier on the
brain.  That's why Galene implements peer-to-peer file transfer: just
click on a username in the web interface, and choose "send file".

Due to an unfortunate limitation in Chromium-based browsers[1], file
transfers of more than a couple of GB crash the browser tab.  I could
probably work around the Chromium bug, but it was both more fun and more
friendly to Read Men (and Real Women) to write a native command-line
client for file transfer.

Please do

    git clone https://github.com/jech/galene-file-tranfer

and read the included README:

    https://github.com/jech/galene-file-transfer/blob/master/README

For lazy people, binaries for Linux/AMD64, Linux/ARM64 and Windows are here:

    https://www.irif.fr/~jch/software/files/


[1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/webrtc/issues/detail?id=2276

-- Juliusz

[Galene] Re: Command-line client for Galene file transfer

[Juliusz Chroboczek]

> a native command-line client for file transfer.

To answer in public the question I got by private mail:

  - the transfer is peer-to-peer, the server is only used for NAT
    traversal and for exchanging cryptographic keys; hence, you're not
    putting any significant load on the server if you use this to backup
    the collection of movies that you legally acquired;

  - the transfer is encrypted end-to-end; however,

     (1) the server gets to learn the filenames and file sizes;
     (2) the server can trivially mount an MiTM attack.

    so you must use a trusted server if you wish to preserve a semblance
    of privacy.

I am fairly confident that the latter caveat also applies to Zoom's
"end-to-end" encryption.  Do not trust any software, especially if you
didn't write it yourself.

-- Juliusz