Beaker Browser

Contributing to the Beaker Browser peer-to-peer browser project.

A peer-to-peer browser for Web hackers.

I followed the instructions on the docs.beakerbrowser.com subsite which explain how to get started.

Beaker Browser is delivered as a fork of Chromium and is wrapped inside an Electron app. Much like Patchwork is on Scuttlebutt.

Getting started was straightforward.

  1. Download and install the application.
  2. Start the application and Beaker Browser will have created a new profile (Hyperdrive) for you.
  3. Start editing your profile page:
    1. Changed the title and the description
    2. Added a picture as thumb.png
    3. Copied over HTML, JS and CSS from my existing homepage.

Next steps include:

  • ✅ Learn about Web Components
  • ✅ Learn more about Hyperdrive and DAT protocol
  • ✅ Help test out new Beaker Browser releases.

Updates

2019-06-11

I've been testing out Beaker Browser for a couple of months now and I am extremely impressed. So much even that I have been neglecting this very site over it. Setting up my personal Hyperdrive was a cool learning experience. It's amazing how much can be done using Beaker Browser's API. Best of all it's only a "beta" release. More cool features are coming soon.

You can say that Beaker browser got me really excited about the modern peer-to-peer Web.

2021-10-31

I had fun working on my first BeakerBrowser Hyperdrive profile for a couple of months. But that fun stopped when I lost the Hyperdrive keys from my personal PC due to a backup screw-up. So it is now impossible for me to make any edits to the existing hyperdrive site. It's still there, being hosted by other Beaker Browser users, but its content will never change.

This is one of the reasons why I have upgraded my existing HTTPS site with the Eleventy site generator and made mirrors of it on IPFS and now also a new hyperdrive on Beakerbrowser.

I hope this time I won't lose the private keys...