FAQ - Forban http://www.foo.be/forban/ == Protocol == Q1. Why don't you use SSDP, Bonjour or any other existing service announce and discovery in Forban? Forban was first designed to rely on SSDP but we quickly discovered various limitation or overhead that limited us to use it. One the major limitation is the requirement to include a Host: entry in a SSDP Notify message. One of the main concept behind Forban is the ability to setup something quickly even if IP addresses behind are changing regularly. So we changed to a simple flooding announce message without auto-shut-off algorithm or ssdp:byebye scheme. We are using the old but functional broadcast in IPv4 that allows Forban to work even where multicast is not properly switched. We choose to design a small and stateless announce protocol that can be implemented without an XML parser or any complex state machine. For more information : http://www.gitorious.org/forban/forban/blobs/master/README Q2. Why Forban is configured by default in opportunistic mode and getting all in files in its proximity? That was the core idea of Forban when the project started. When you start for the first time your Forban, it will fetch automatically all files from his proximity. This is quite important for very ephemeral connectivity. So the gossip operation or the epidemic algorithm is the standard way of operation. This was there to ensure a kind of persistence of the data replicated. If you don't want to use the opportunistic mode, there is the shared mode, where you can propose files to be downloaded but where your Forban is not doing the replication of all the files in its surrounding. You can still download the files in a more conventional way using the web interface. To change between the two modes, you'll just need to set it in the configuration : mode = opportunistic or mode = shared == Operation == Q3. Why can't I see any Forban while using the Wireless network? To discover Forban, there is a simple discovery service looking for specific broadcast packet in IPv4 and multicast packet in IPv6. Some Wireless network are blocking those packets between wireless clients. You must allow broadcast and/or multicast paquet on your Wireless access-point. Q4. I can see Forban in the interface but it can't copy any files? The port used for communication is the TCP port 12555 using the standard HTTP protocol. Maybe you have a local firewall or packet filter on the machine blocking the TCP port 1255. The UDP port 12555 is also used for the discovery. == Security == Q5. Forban can be used to automatically distribute malware or viruses? Yes but just like any other opportunistic file exchange scheme or even HTTP services. This can be used as an easy way to exchange malware or viruses. User must always use the appropriate measure to protect his computer or mobile device (e.g. using a filter list in Forban, using an updated antivirus). If you have any question or ideas, send them to adulau @ foo . be