Status of this project? / Whonix-Workstation i2p Default Installation

[adrelanos]

Work was recently done towards installing i2p by default inside Whonix-Workstation.

Packages i2p, i2p-router, preconfigured router config and i2pbrowser were brought up to speed. This discussion happened here:

https://forums.whonix.org/t/installation-and-fix-of-i2p-inside-whonix-workstation-by-default/8610

Quote https://github.com/eyedeekay/i2pdistro#why-not-tails-or-whonix

Official inclusion in Whonix is dependent on inclusion in Debian, but we may be able to generate VM Images of the style used for Qubes-Whonix independently while working on that problem. Currently regarding this as a major stretch goal but I might be able to get some help on it.

There is now https://packages.debian.org/i2p-router so that would be resolved?

Is there other software than i2p-router that would be installed by default in i2pdistro?

I said a lot things in past. Sometimes perhaps in confusing ways. Things might have changed. Context also depends on "Patrick should do it" vs "there's a maintainer". Let's see. Happy to discuss.

[eyedeekay]

Hi! I've been meaning to get back to you about all of this but it's just been non-stop since December. This project repo here is... unmaintained at best, I'll probably delete it soon. There is little reason for it because as you say, i2p-router is in Debian. Since this isn't really something that needs to exist anymore, I've focused on other things. We do have a Debian maintainer for these packages in mhatta, and he's usually responsive but sometimes packages do lag behind. I don't intend to duplicate your work here. Re: what would need to be installed by default in i2pdistro, depends on the vision. I don't think that in Whonix's vision, with Whonix's threat model, that any additional software would be required, but I'm a little on the fence about all that.

So... crazy question... does SecBrowser support browser extensions and container tabs? This one: https://github.com/eyedeekay/I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox is about to leave experimental status as soon as transmission-rpc is ready, and already has Debian package based side-loading. Using it as an extension to SecBrowser might be a better way to do an I2P Browser than mucking around with user.js files and stuff.

[adrelanos]

idk:

So... crazy question... does SecBrowser support browser extensions and container tabs?

Extensions: same as Tor Browser.

Container tabs: I never used these but probably functional same as Tor Browser.

SecBrowser doesn't break "much". See these files what "little" it does:

• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/blob/master/usr/bin/secbrowser
• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/blob/master/usr/share/secbrowser/user.js
• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/blob/master/usr/share/secbrowser/variables.bsh

This one: https://github.com/eyedeekay/I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox is about to leave experimental status as soon as transmission-rpc is ready, and already has Debian package based side-loading. Using it as an extension to SecBrowser might be a better way to do an I2P Browser than mucking around with user.js files and stuff.

There is a tiny bad news but it really shouldn't matter. SecBrowser is focused on non-anonymous browsing only. As per "product placement" it will always prioritize security over privacy/anonymity.

But SecBrowser doesn't matter since there already is i2pbrowser:

• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/blob/master/usr/bin/i2pbrowser
• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/blob/master/usr/bin/torbrowser#L518-L578
• https://github.com/Whonix/tb-starter/tree/master/usr/share/tb-profile-i2p

That could be expanded upon.

Not sure if a useful question to ask but is I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox compatible with Tor Browser?

Otherwise we could also consider Firefox + I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox?

Using it as an extension to SecBrowser might be a better way to do an I2P Browser than mucking around with user.js files and stuff.

Replace SecBrowser with i2pbrowser or Firefox and this might work.

Is I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox compatible with the i2p package from package.debian.org buster repository? Is this explicitly a development goal / tested?

/cc @HulaHoopWhonix

[adrelanos]

now also discussed here: https://forums.whonix.org/t/installation-and-fix-of-i2p-inside-whonix-workstation-by-default/8610/127

[eyedeekay]

Compatibility with Tor Browse can be achieved by setting browser.privatebrowsing.autostart=false as described here(Is this a Whonix person too?) https://github.com/eyedeekay/I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox/issues/79, it would appear that this is the only required workaround to make it work. However, I think the reason that setting enables the extension to work may be because all webextensions are disabled in private tabs by default. If it is possible to enable running that specific extension in private tabs by default without user intervention, that might be the more advisable setting to change(especially in i2pbrowser), but I don't know if that setting is accessible anywhere but via the extension menu itself.

Disabling that setting I guess means that we lose the things Private Browsing does by default, but I've already committed to doing them myself when I have to anyway. One thing I need to figure out if I need to do is make history/cache management more aggressive when the non-extension proxy settings are also configured for I2P, and when I update that code I will also document where history/cache management is invoked and on what, right now it is when the user intervenes to close all I2P Browsing tabs and when the browser is closed, but it should also be invoked for I2P Browsing tabs when the last I2P Browsing tab is closed as well(even if the browser itself isn't closed and other tabs remain active). That's really the crux of the dilemma, I think this setting is important to some definition of Disk Avoidance and I'm not sure how to safely affect it, especially since certain things are kind of inherently contradictory about I2P and disk-avoidance(P2P filesharing after all).

It should be fully compatible with any version of I2P in use right now, including i2pd technically, but it's designed primarily for Java I2P and most of the features are oriented toward that, and that's where most of the testing takes place.

In practical terms it should all be pretty easy, I just wish I had a better handle on all the consequences.

[eyedeekay]

Oh BTW, I'm having some trouble with my Whonix forum account(Can't seem to get past 2FA with a code?), but unlike this distro project, the extension is a legitimate priority for me, I do actively develop and maintain it, work on new features, test it, dogfood, think about it's future. I'll also help developers who want to work on it, so if I'm hit by a bus or something somebody else can take over, but there aren't any of those yet. Regardless, I the webextension will be developed by me for as long as I can possibly plan ahead.

[Thinkablemell0w]

(Is this a Whonix person too?) eyedeekay/I2P-in-Private-Browsing-Mode-Firefox#79

No not really

Whonix decided not to include your Addon (at least not now) https://forums.whonix.org/t/installation-and-fix-of-i2p-inside-whonix-workstation-by-default/8610/143 The "Reasons" for that can be found in the Thread

That's really the crux of the dilemma, I think this setting is important to some definition of Disk Avoidance and I'm not sure how to safely affect it, especially since certain things are kind of inherently contradictory about I2P and disk-avoidance(P2P filesharing after all).

Right, I2P's and Tor's use case differ quite a bit, it seems quite contradictory to try to mimic the Disk Avoidance of TBB one by one, when a lot of info gets written by the Router anyway, or am i missing something ?

the extension is a legitimate priority for me, I do actively develop and maintain it, work on new features, test it, dogfood, think about it's future

That's good to know. thanks for your effort

I'll also help developers who want to work on it, so if I'm hit by a bus or something somebody else can take over, but there aren't any of those yet.

I'm working on that, but this is a whole new territory for me and spare time is rare atm so it might take a while to catch up