> Dial keys

Maybe it's in the video I didn't watch, but I really think paragraph one should make clear what kind of keys and why. Cryptographic? Asymmetric? How do they do the job, at even the most basic level? It never explains, just dives into abstract claims of superiority and usage stats. I gather relays are involved; this would be a good thing to mention right away instead of making me sift it from the HN discussion.

▲ morphism 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

While the frontpage doesn't go in depth, the docs quickly do: First with https://docs.iroh.computer/what-is-iroh and then following up with the how it works section. The docs are actually good from what I can see so far. From what questions you brought up so for it seems to answer them pretty quickly.

▲ andrewflnr 4 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

I'd quibble with "quickly", but sure, this seems like the starting point for figuring out how it works: https://docs.iroh.computer/concepts/endpoints From a marketing standpoint, for a technical audience, I think it should be quicker.

▲ sva_ 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The doc still doesn't show what such a 'key' looks like? Why can't there be a simple infographic that goes like

    127.0.0.1 -> 'key'

	▲	andrewflnr 2 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		They mention later on it's an Ed25519 key.
	▲	morphism 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		The info graphic shows the flow in `What is iroh?`, and quickly looking at the endpoint area you can see what the key is: https://docs.iroh.computer/connecting/creating-endpoint#pers... It might be the docs just mesh with how I think about things. The creators should expand on this, since people seem to not mesh with the current info.
	▲	asdfaoeu an hour ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		It seems to use DHT under the hood whether directly or through a relay. https://pkdns.net/ .
	▲	2 hours ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
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▲ isodev 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I saw the video and still have no idea what they are. Also, “never locked in” but then “pricing” and why is one paying for “apps” but self hosting relays?

	▲	spencerflem 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		As I understand it- you can use free community provided relays, self-host your own, or pay for their managed services with an SLA and monitoring built in

▲ dotancohen 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

  > Dial keys. Not IPs.
  > It's a simple idea really, and it's the right abstraction for the future of the internet. IP addresses can break, without warning, and it's outside of your device's control. Keys, however, are created & controlled by you. They stay the same as your device moves, and are yours to throw away, or not. IP addresses can be private and inaccessible behind firewalls, but with iroh your device can be securely addressable no matter where it is.

To me that just sounds like a reimplementation of DNS. Maybe decentralised and maybe free and maybe not monomeric, but broadly the same.

	▲	Folcon 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		The biggest difference that I can see is that keys are not making any claims about ownership, there's no global registry and it's p2p, which is a big upside

▲ taf2 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

when i read "keys" i figured "names" like in my .ssh/config a named host that i access with a key... but listening more it sounds like a new way to do networking over QUIC...

▲ spencerflem 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Having spent a while trying to understand it, I believe the keys are serving a dual purpose as an encryption key and as a stable identifier along the lines of a session cookie that might be used for a WebRTC video call.

Here's my summary from Lobste.rs, keeping in mind I'm not an expert and only found this project today:

> [..] this is closer to an opinionated WebRTC setup that handles assigning a persistent ID to clients. All the work of making a signaling server is taken care of and the solution is generic enough and cheap enough to run that you can get away with using a community hosted one. Kinda similar to what you get with Steam’s proprietary p2p gamenetworkingsocket infrastructure

https://lobste.rs/s/cslljn/iroh_1_0_dial_keys_not_ips#c_s3na...