[cgtzczykldpq]

> I tried to connect to freenet last year and I literally couldn't work it out.

Sorry but that must have been a bug or misconfiguration on your machine:

It should connect to the network by default without any tinkering.

Perhaps you didn't pay close attention to the first-time wizard and told it to only connect to manually chosen peers instead of connecting to random strangers? If you then don't add peers manually you won't have any connections.

> The GUI didn't make much sense, I couldn't work out where I was meant to go to browse content.

The default feature is browsing HTML content just like on the regular web.

By default it ships some bookmarks to "index" sites, i.e. sites which list links to plenty of other sites.

Those bookmarks should be right at the main page of the UI at http://127.0.0.1:8888

[SilverRed]

I was using some unofficial packages since installing java on my system is difficult so I used the first flatpak and the first docker image I found on google and neither of them shipped an included browser and it seemed like the way was to make firefox work with it but I could not work that out.

It's been too long for me to remember the exact details but if I couldn't work out how to make it run as a long time linux and p2p user, I can't see how the average user could.

[cgtzczykldpq]

Yeah there are no official flatpaks or docker images so you were using 3rd-party software and this is not Freenet's fault :)

Perhaps you can update your topmost post to mention that?

The official installers are here: https://freenetproject.org/pages/download.html

Thanks for clarifying though!

[djcapelis]

Offering only a Java installer, of all things from the increasingly distant past, wholly divorced from any semblance on how most anyone wants to install or use software these days, is 100% a choice the freenet project made and entirely that project’s fault.

This type of uncaring about the user experience nonsense is exactly the type of issue that the person you’re replying to is sharing about their experience.

[ArneBab]

Do you want to help fix the debian installer? Freenet has been providing a Gentoo package for years. Other distributions need more work. If you have the skills, then please help updating the debian package! https://github.com/freenet/debian

[Gigachad]

These days you just ship it in a flatpak which is easy to install on any system. Distro specific packaging is a relic these days.

[ArneBab]

A pull-request (or repo) with a flatpak recipe would be very welcome, too.

Though distro-packaging in Guix is still far superior to a flatpak, because it gives the freedom of flatpaks but integrates much better.