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Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

cend.me

81–90 of 134 posts

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#81
post #69
post #9

Alternatively, using the same technology: https://www.sharedrop.io/ and actually multiple others. Quite convincing to transfer files between devices in LAN, instead of looking for USB cable to connect the phone or trying to establish (never working and much slower) Bluetooth connection.

You find it easier than just using your phone's file manager to access shared drives?

Shared drives ?

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#82
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Samba, NFS, SSH, scp, there are tons of ways to locally transfer files without a server if you know the IP address.

Samba without a server? Maybe this is a new feature, I must look into it.

One machine is always the server and the other one the slave to it, it's like that with most transfer protocols, including scp and nfs

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#83
post #15

Used to use sharedrop.io but found the “saved messages” option in Telegram is just the most zero friction option for mobile desktop transfers.

It's very slow for big files though, and requires several clicks on the 2 devices. If you are on the local network, kde-connect is still the golden standard provided you use linux (even with gnome) and android:

- click on the top bar menu to select your device

- select the file

- done

It uploads automatically in the download folder of the other device. It uses the local network speed. Doesn't require additional clicks.

But as soon as I'm on 4G, telegram saved messages is what I use too. In fact, I use it to takes vocal notes, pictures of stuff to remind me later, schedule reminders (yes, it has delayed messages!) and so on. It's my inbox basket for GTD at this point.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#84
post #65
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use Whatsapp for that purpose. 1. create a group with some one on your contact list. 2. Kick the other person out of group 3. now, attach any file you want to the group and access it via whatsapp web. Pretty simple to setup and use. for larger files, i would use ftp client on Mobile and use it to transfer files

Seems to me that this strategy requires blind trust in Mark Zuckerberg.

I don't think Mark Zuckerberg has broken E2E encryption yet. But yes, there is some metadata.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#85

Why would anyone use this service when you can just transfer files by temporarely opening a TCP port and starting a netcat listener that you pipe into the file you want? It's as simple as nc -lvnp 1234 > myfile.txt The other party then only needs to pipe the file into a netcat socket from their commandline. nc -w 3 IP Jokes aside I'm intrigued at the "no server involvement". I'm assuming they mean the file isn't tran…

I don't think transferring a file via netcat without any form of encryption is something i would recommend, unless you are on a network you 100% trust. EDIT: it seems like this service doesn't even support HTTPS...

Just add gpg to the pipes.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, today it's much harder to transfer files in a local network without using cloud (or external coordinator), for some reason.

Back in the early '2000s we had two home PCs with Windows (98 and 2000/XP), it was a breeze (relatively) to make the two PCs see each other in the LAN, using the legacy workgroup + shared folder/drive letters. of course security was near nonexistent, but it was home LAN, and convenience trumped all. Nowadays I have NO idea if I could do a similar setup with Windows 10 without resorting to the cloud

You can still do that!

Make the PC see each other in the LAN is just a matter of ticking one box. I typically create a folder somewhere and give r/w access to everyone then I proceed to log in with the credentials of the computer then put whatever I want. After I am finished I delete the folder. I think it uses SMB under the hood.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#88
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Click to Chat" in play store. "Whatsapp Dialer" in app store. Or clicking on this link (replace example phone # with your phone number): wa.me/17861234567 1 is US's country code. 786 is Miami's / Operator code 1234567 is the phone number

This seems incredibly clunky compared to Signal where you by design can message yourself without any hassle (and you're called "Note to Self" in the chat list).

iirc you could do that in the early days of WhatsApp. Dunno why they removed it though.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#89
post #9

Alternatively, using the same technology: https://www.sharedrop.io/ and actually multiple others. Quite convincing to transfer files between devices in LAN, instead of looking for USB cable to connect the phone or trying to establish (never working and much slower) Bluetooth connection.

There are indeed a lot of similar options. Personally I'm partial to https://file.pizza/ because I find the toppings based URL scheme clever and fairly easy to communicate.

Re: Direct file transfer via browser with no server involvement

#90
post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even, the application is making GET, POST and PUT requests to send the file to a /link endpoint which also the receiving side is hitting. How is this even close to being "no server involvement"? It's misleading, because the server is very much involved here. > But I suppose that would be basically impossible on today's internet. P2P is possible on the internet (100% without centralized servers), but it's not poss…

>the application is making GET, POST and PUT requests to send the file Have you looked at the actual payload of the POST/GET/PUT requests? It only contains the WebRTC offers/answers. Actual file transfer is via local WebRTC. The site also claims that it only work for "devices on the same network", so there's no need for any STUN/TURN because there's no wall to punch.

Even on the same network you might need TURN. Browsers use mDNS addresses for local connections rather than leaking internal IPs and if your network doesn’t work with it then a direct connection will fail. You can disable this but it’s not ideal.

Getting P2P connections working reliably is an effort in edge case discovery and either fixing it or falling back.

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