Sharing pictures and home movies with Retroshare

File sharing (and I don't mean illegal file sharing) can be tough in today's world.  I have a collection of pictures and home movies that I would like to share with friends and family.  Sure, there are websites like Facebook, and Dropbox that will allow you to share pictures/files, but Dropbox only gives you so much space.  Facebook downsizes your pictures.  I have 13GB's of family photos.   My brother has a really nice camera, and I would like to download some of his photos of family functions.

While searching for an answer, I stumbled upon Retroshare.  Retroshare is a peer-to-peer social media platform.  What does it mean to be peer-to-peer?  It means there is no central server.  Since there is no central server, then there is no body that can snoop on you.  There is no limit on how much can be shared.  Retroshare supports messaging, chat rooms and file sharing.  All communication is encrypted.  This is far more secure than I needed, but I'm not one to turn down extra security if its built in.

The extra security does have some drawbacks, however.  Encryption is built around GPG keys.  Every person generates their own public/private key pair.  To "friend" someone, you give them your public key, and they give you their public key.  Once keys are exchanged, you can connect to each other.  That part is what is a little confusing for many people.  Retroshare does a good job of walking you through the process, but it still uses the technical terms that make it very intimidating.  Only 1/3 of my friends and family that I tried to get connect actually set it up.  All of that 1/3 were technical people.  By technical, I don't mean software engineers.  By technical I mean they can install Windows from scratch.

File sharing is really easy.  You select what folders to share, and then all those files are available for your friends to download.  Retroshare also makes use of distributed technology.  If two people in my circle have the same exact file, and a third starts downloading it, then that person will download it from both people who have that file.  With such a small circle, we aren't talking about a big performance boost, but it is a novel feature.

The UPnp functionality to automatically set up port forwarding was a bit spotty.  My Gentoo server did not self-configure but my Gentoo laptop did.  One of the people in my circle uses the Windows client, and that did not set up port forwarding correctly.  This is another hurdle for non-technical people who fear the router.

The software does lack some features that would be pretty nice.  I want the ability to remotely control Retroshare.  If I'm on the road, and I am exchanging keys with a family member (most likely because I'm setting up Retroshare for them), I want to be able to import the keys remotely.  I want to be able to test the connectivity while I'm there.  The encrypted messaging and chat room feature is nice, but I tend to use my phone for that type of communication.  There currently isn't a mobile app available for the iPhone or Android.  Retroshare doesn't currently have classifications of friends.  Everyone you exchange keys with can see every file you have shared.  It would be nice to classify people into groups, then allow certain groups access to certain folders.

Overall, I am really excited about Retroshare.  It does have a long road ahead of it before the masses can start using it, but I think its good enough for my friends and family to share photos and home movies.  Once the software is set up, it is pretty user friendly.  If you don't mind configuring it on all your friends computers, then you might want to consider being an early adopter.