Internet without hierarchies, without providers and without limitations of any kind, where every single node is an integral part of the network. This is ninux and was created by a group of computer scientists and engineers, who then joined a whole community of experts and enthusiasts who contributed to the multiplication of access points.
The spirit of the community is the sharing of knowledge and the experimentation of new technologies, those same impulses that animated the researcher Norman Abramson and his colleagues at the University of Hawaii, in the early 70s when, through low-power radio masts, they attempted to connect users located on remote islands to the main computer in Honolulu.
Thanks to the participation of personalities of the caliber of David Boggs, which came from the Xerox research center in Palo Alto and from Bob Metcalfe, future founder of 3Com, who had just graduated from MIT at the time, the project laid the foundations for the creation of ALOHANET, forerunner of the Internet, but equipped with a wireless infrastructure, just like that of Ninux.
In the '70s the concept of computer local area network did not yet exist, that of Metcalfe and Boggs was historically the first. Today Ninux is based on the evolution of that first protocol devised by the two scholars to transmit signals in their network, which was then standardized byIEEE like 802.3 and then how 802.11a/b/g/n wireless standards. The topology chosen by Ninux for its infrastructure is that "Knitted“, a system that makes the network very robust, as it provides multiple connections between all points. If, for example, a node in the mesh fails, the neighboring nodes simply look for other paths to transmit the signal, in a completely transparent way for the user.
Ninux is not an isolated case, nor is it the first network of its kind. Already in 2000, in fact, a Seattle a wireless community network with characteristics similar to those of Ninux and, subsequently, that idea inspired the creation of the Freifunk network in Berlin need Guifi.net in Spain, both built through the installation of antennas on the roofs of users' homes.
To get an idea of how important the wireless community network phenomenon has become, just think of the fact that, many WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider), for example in Italy, have turned to Ninux, to overcome the problem of digital divide. That is, they asked for know-how and infrastructure to reach and connect houses lost in the countryside. Even Google has considered the project and has included it in its global program "Google Summer of Code 2012" as a "mentoring organization" or as an open source project - because Ninux also aims to promote the open source philosophy - for the writing of open code by students from all over the world, financed with a scholarship.
Ninux also participated in the fifth edition of the “Wireless Battle of the Mesh”, in Athens between 26 March and 1 April 2012. The event made it possible to test the efficiency of the routing protocols used, highlighting, among other things, the foresight of the Italian project. In fact, Ninux employs, in advance of most of the Internet, IP version 6 addresses, or the addressing system that will allow the network to expand beyond the limits imposed by the now inadequate technology IPv4. Migration has long been seen as enabling element for the path of innovation and growth underpinning theDigital Agenda for Europe.
Ninux's goal, mind you, is not to provide Internet access, but is to build a network infrastructure that aims to become, if not a new reality like it, an integral part of it, but largely made up of excellence, both in terms of technologies and as strategies for disseminating knowledge .
How can you join Ninux? Just create a node with an antenna, pointing it at a sector or point where another node already exists. The connection is symmetrical by nature and, unlike normal domestic ADSL, whose upload capacity is often limited, it allows share any service or data with another user in a peer to peer logic. Once online it is possible use and provide services such as telephonyVoIP), the exchange of content and also access to the Internet. As already stated, Ninux is creating its own piece of the Internet, on a par with Telecom, Fastweb and Google. More precisely Ninux is theAutonomous System No. 197835 of the global network. For details just point to the site www.ninux.org
