I use OpenNIC for DNS, it's cool, independent and custom
Permalink | Author: Dan Dart | Published: 2025-03-14 18:30:00 UTC | Tags: cool custom dns independent networking opennic
Ever wish you could register domain names for free, with cool TLDs? Well... you can, in a private, democratic community namespace.
So what is it?
It's a set of community-maintained DNS servers, some of which run with DoH, DoT, DNSSEC and claim to not log, etc.
What's so good about that? Doesn't everybody do that? What's the niche, then?
The niche here is a set of custom, OpenNIC-only TLDs you can register and maintain for free, which is kind of neat.
What about TLS, though? How do you get certificates for it? Surely if other DNS providers don't understand
Well, what you can do is that you can use custom certificates. Of course, this means you'll need to do one of two things:
- Create and self-sign your own certificate This means that everybody will have to trust you and pass through the yellow screens when visiting your website.
- Create and run your own certificate authority on your own computer This means that you, and only you, will not have to face the yellow screens, and it's kind of useful. It still protects against man-in-the-middle attacks, because you'll have to click through otherwise signed certificates.
- Import a "special" root certificate from the wiki, then run ACME against their server, specifically. This means you can share the authority between users of the authority, and that you'll have to trust the authority, but otherwise no yellow screens.
Nice. Anything else you can do with it?
There's always volunteering to run a DNS server or providing translations if you're multilingual.
That's pretty cool. How do I get started?
Simply visit their website. You'll find information about what DNS servers to add that are closest to you, and you can decide what kind of domains you wish to register. There are some pretty gnarly ones available.
Ta-ta!
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Xenon Web Desktop Alpha2 Released
Permalink | Author: Dan Dart | Published: 2010-02-01 22:17:00 UTC | Tags: blog cool desktop email linux mysql operating system php web xenon
The web desktop Xenon released version Alpha2 today. The release announcement from the website reads:
"Changes from Alpha include many security fixes (including SQL injection), the addition of the Chatroom app, Pictures app, width autoscaling, new tab launching, easier installation and various visual tweaks.
Please either use the https://web.archive.org/web/20100107134808/https://xenon.kevinghadyani.com/ (edit 2021: archived), or ddownload to your server at xenon.kevinghadyani.com/xenon_alpha2.tar.bz2 (edit 2021: not archived). Please help by submitting bugs, patches, new apps, icons, etc to xenon@dandart.co.uk. Thank you."
Xenon is a web desktop, which means that all your applications, work and settings are stored on the web. It can be run from any Internet-connected computer by browsing to the Xenon server or from your own server (in the case that you want a private instance, or want it installed into a netbook in the case where you do not have Internet connectivity). Eventually syncing support will be brought in which allows you to sync your settings and files to and from your local instance and the main server. Other features currently available include:
- Audio player (featuring HTML5 Vorbis audio)
- Video player (featuring HTML5 Theora video)
- Picture viewer
- Email (including within Xenon and outgoing email)
- Blog
- Chatroom (Public, open to all on the same instance)
- Notes application
- Friends application for social features
- My Files, to upload various types of file
- Wallpaper switcher
Upcoming features include:
- Settings syncing and importing
- A small footprint netbook/touchbook operating system to run on
- Many others
To try the system out for yourself, you can try the demo (edit 2021: archived) or download the software at xenon.kevinghadyani.com/xenon_alpha2.tar.bz2 (edit 2021: not archived) to your server.
Please send patches, icons, ideas, apps, et al to xenon@dandart.co.uk
The project's website is at https://xenon.kevinghadyani.com (edit 2021: archived) or a shorter version: https://hackerlanes.com (edit 2021: archived)
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