Creating Freenet Websites
Content
The first thing you need is some content to insert. A Freenet site ("freesite") is basically structured like a website, with a few more restrictions:
* No Flash or Javascript.
* Your site should live within one main directory, with optional subdirectories.
* Your start page should be named "index.html". Not "index.htm" or "Index.html" or anything else.
* If you link to content within a subdirectory, you must explicitly link to a file within that subdirectory (e.g., "subdir/index.html"), not to the subdirectory itself.
* All the files your site contains need to be readable by whichever tool you'll be using to do the insertion. This is especially important if you're inserting directly through the node's TMCI interface -- be sure the node has permission to access all the files.
SSK Keypair
The next thing you'll need is an SSK keypair. This consists of two parts: the public key (or "request URI"), and the private key (or "insert URI"). You should keep the private key secret. The insertion tools (discussed below) will allow you to generate this keypair, so we'll leave syntax issues for later.
An SSK keypair is also used for USKs, and most people will probably want to use a USK when they insert their freesites, because USKs allow easy updating of content.
From the reader's point of view, an SSK (or USK) acts like a domain name. You may have any number of different sites published using the same SSK keypair, and the fact that they all share the same SSK will "prove" that they're inserted by the same entity (as long as the private key is indeed private).
If you don't want your readers to know that you are the sole entity behind all these freesites, then you may make as many SSK keypairs as you like, and publish each freesite under a different keypair.
Insertion Tools
There are a number of applications available to help you create your own pages, or freesites, on Freenet:
jSite
jSite is a graphical application that you can use to create, insert and manage your own freesites. For more information, go to the jSite page.
fntool
fntool is a command line based tool for fetching and inserting content into Freenet 0.7, designed to be usable from scripts. It's written in Java, so should work equally well on any platform (Java 1.4 upwards).
Extract package and run without arguments for help:
java -jar lib/fntool.jar
An example command to insert a Freesite:
java -jar lib/fntool.jar --putdir --key "CHK@" --dir <dir>
Available from:
http://www.accidentalegg.co.uk/daveware/fntool/
...or...
On Freenet 0.7
FUQID
Freenet Utility for Queued Inserts and Downloads - a windows application that's been ported to 0.7. Available from http://download.apophis.li/
Telnet/FCP/TMCI
The node offers two interfaces for content insertion: FCP and TMCI. FCP is the Freenet Client Protocol, normally used by sophisticated client programs. It's not really suited to human use, but you can talk to it using telnet.
TMCI is the Telnet Mode Command-line Interface, and is designed for humans to talk to it manually. Making a telnet connection to this port (2323 by default; your node's configuration may differ) will give you a list of commands. We're only interested in two of them right now:
* MAKESSK - This is the command to create an SSK keypair. Simply type this, and record the output it gives you, which will include the request URI and the insert URI.
* PUTSSKDIR - This is the command to insert your freesite. You'll need your insert URI from the previous step, and the full name of the top-level directory of your freesite. (Remember, the node must be able to read this directory.)
If you want to insert your freesite using a USK (highly recommended), then simply replace the SSK at the start of your insert URI with USK. After the request URI, you put a string which identifies your freesite, another forward slash, and then the version number. Use a version number of -1 if you want your USK to automatically use the "next available version". Then use the PUTSSKDIR command; for example,
PUTSSKDIR:USK@xxx,yyy/yoursitename/-1#/path/to/your/site
