As in topic, why did you decided to be closed source?

One of the concerns of open-sourcing an encrypted networking is primarily that it delivers a simplified mechanism of developing exploits that would not be plainly visible without a thorough reading of the src code.

The other reason for not doing so lies in controlling the direction of developement, many projects take the open src route only to disintergrate into multiple forks each having some value but detracting overall from a single implementation, this becomes both a source of annoyance as well as adding stress and competition into what was previously an enjoyable enterprise.

It stands to reason that the main creator of a programme has put in the bulk of the work and would thus have a vested interest in ensuring it is well maintained and further enhanced, when their are "wolves" at the developers door all adding dubious additions and in some cases dangerous implementations that do not correctly follow the clients general security architecture it makes sense that any developer would throw up their hands and say "why am I bothering ?".

I am not the developer of this network and thus speak with my own guess at what the potential issues are, my view is that until theres a reason for variations or forks in the future for some reason we sit back and let those doing their best to offer users their time and talent get on with it unmolested, the programme is free to its users & of annoyances and is being crafted with skill and an eye open for user input, what can we really want further for free?

If anyone wishes to purchase the src and has a lot of money to spare for over two years of work then thats another story, but one I wont concern myself with.

why be open source? so someone can take the code, make a crap version, and confuse people.

...which is not the point of open source though. BitTorrent itself is open-source, and look how it is florishing. Many open source projects I know are just flooded with commits, fixing bugs here, boosting the performance there. And, oh wow, they still work and people do not get confused!
On the other hand, if the author of fopnu and Tixati disappears (which we do not hope for the next decades!), both programs will be obsolete after their last update. What then? Abandon Tixati/fopnu? I doubt many people would prefer switching to another client of their taste (which is hard for fopnu and its own, special file transfer protocol, as it is the only program to support it), but for BitTorrent and its ongoing development, it can be the only thing for users of Tixati to come (unless they want to use the outdated version in the future).
So with the demise of fopnu, there is the demise of fopnu's protocol. Surely people will use it furthermore, but using outdated clients and protocols is risky, as malware can be spread super-easy and malicious codes could be executed without the user knowing.

Now, quite a few users of Tixati do appreciate the program becoming open-source, as some "features" in it make them unable to work with Tixati in a useful way. I love Tixati, but e.g. the feature of faking its peer-ID makes me not want to use this program any further, as some trackers wouldn't allow Tixati although everything that is needed is just working fine (e.g. sending the correct data back to the tracker - which was the main issue of Tixati being banned on many trackers).


I know, I know, sounds horrible - I believe that Kevin will pass on the source code to someone else, someone loyal, to let updates be rolled out for the coming years/decades.

Respecting the authors of fopnu and Tixati, I do understand them in some ways. It is your own little project, that you treated with love and worked on with a lot of time. With open-source, there don't always come many advantages, but, excuse my tone, idiots, that think they might be smarter than one on their own. Creating codes that make the program worse, "fixing" "bugs", and all that stuff combined.

If you ever read this, Tixati and fopnu guys:
I really, really love your projects. But please, keep an eye out for the community. Even though there are a lot of people writing nonsense, there indeed are quite a few giving good advice. They probably even donated once, which I would do, but some things, as I wrote, hinder me from using fopnu and Tixati.

Other than that, I congratulate you for reading this wall of text.

Bittorent is a protocol, not a program.


That's your second mistake.

So? It was surely meant to be compared with fopnu's protocol, as an example.

Yet again, there are a lot of programs just working fine while being open-source, beginning with LibreOffice to qBittorrent (well, more or less), VLC player, Mozilla Thunderbird and so on. Now show me which regular PC users are being confused with these programs. As long as there is an official source for the program, there won't be many users being confused by shady internet businesses.



Well, I don't know anything about you and your research, neither do you know about Guest and his/her research(es). As for what I have seen, there are quite some complaints about Tixati not being open-source, but as many that like it to stay closed source.



Not saying that I prefer open-source, but it is up to the developers what to do with the source code. As the company's name is "Tixati Inc.", I doubt it will happen at any time we will see the source codes of Tixati and fopnu, just like uTorrent/BitTorrent. And we all know what happened to them...


Anyway, thanks for contributing in a *very* useful way - staying anonymous behind the 'Guest' name while trolling. Really makes you proving your points in every way.
But who am I to judge.


/discussions on the internet, 2k17

I find it rather crass for folks to complain about whether someone else should open source their own work when the person making the demand has done nothing to assist or produce that work, also comparing many of the heavily funded projects with multiple developers with a smaller "one man band" type operation is not portraying the situation accurately.

I too feel that being sarcastic or trolling is very much a waste of everyones time and should be avoided at all costs I hope this is reflected in anyones further posts here, lets be decent to each other and look to build on mutual respect of diversity of opinion.

In my opinion, it could make sense to make the protocol open source. With other people looking at it and perhaps create their own clients, it's a bigger chance that the platform will flourish. As it is now, it's only Tixati users who, when updating their client, may or may not notice the small mention about fopnu. Which makes everyone using any of the other, some more known, torrent clients out there totally ignorant of the existence of fopnu.
And there is not really any info on what fopnu is, except "a new P2P client".

We are all very early into the life of this new network and I believe its rather premature to start the constant drum banging of open source, all this does is create doubt in the mind of the developer over whether they should bother to continue given others seem to want the 2 years hard work for their own good and not the good of the network.

We need to be patient if we want new features and rely on the developers to continue thier work, I for one dont wish to use a network flooded with junk/spambots/exploits all problems that come with open sourcing anything, we are in a good place atm and the protocols being developed are able to be updated and improved simply because there is a single developer whom does not have to negotiate with multiple other follks whom feel their personal concepts and ideas are better and possibly becoming intransigent when others suggest otherwise wasting time and causing bad will all around, I think we have all heard the saying about if it aint broken leave it alone, I suggest we apply that ethos in this case.

Hi there,

Just discovered this website thanks to a link on a forum post of another, open source, P2P client. But unfortunately I couldn't install it as it isn't under a free software license. I mean, I haven't ditched Windows years ago and moved to GNU/Linux to go back to the proprietary world again. That being said, from its presentation the app certainly looks promising and it was easy to find this thread, so I just wanted to chime in and say how I would love to see it open sourced. That's also a good opportunity to answer some of the posts above, so here we go:


This is security through obscurity, and it doesn't really work. If it were true, to take a well-known example the Linux kernel would be a security nightmare but it runs securely on everything like phones, tablets, computers, servers, supercomputers and last but not least, mainframes. In fact the more you have eyeballs looking at the code, the more robust it becomes.

True, but when you free the code, there's also the cooperation side that comes into play. Put simply, more people can do more and friendly competition is a good source for progress.

Well, that may certainly happen if you have enough relevance or a large enough user base. That said, if the other version is crap, then people will flock to the best version. Why not get the best version for the same price (gratis)? But if the other app is also good enough, then the users will have more choice (just look at gtk-gnutella, WireShare and Shareaza for the Gnutella network). In other words, it's a win-win solution.

Also there's another aspect: the security of the network, and of the developer as well. See what happened to Shareaza and Lphant. When the mafiaa threatened them, Shareaza survived because it's free software, some of the devs left but others just kept up and are still keeping up the good work. Lphant, on the other hand, died because it was proprietary, nobody else than the developer who had given in could continue the development. Same for LimeWire for the Gnutella network: WireShare still works, only because some people took the source code and continue the development after the mafiaa thought they had killed the application.

I would take that as a compliment: if your work is bad, nobody is going to care. But if your work is interesting enough for other people, they are going to want to take a closer look at it and contribute. There's also another side: the respect of the end user. If a program is free software, the developer doesn't have unjust power over the user. He won't be able to add any adware, cripple the program or do something similar. If he decides to move on (or is forced to do so, as this happens from time to time with P2P apps), others can pick up the work and continue the development. Plus, the author can retain a lot of rights if he or she chooses a copyleft license like the GNU GPLv3+.

TL;DR: From its presentation, I certainly think that this application is interesting and would love to see it under a free license. Then I would happily contribute translations in two languages, for the app and for the website, to put words where my mouth is.

Someone creates an original work, others looking to enrich themselves in some way put forward implied assertions, they usually follow the same pattern:

"others will help out", " others will add features", others will make it slice bread etc", in the face of it these all sound like nice worthy aims until you loook at the reality, when asked whom will add some kind of code or "value" no names are ever put forward and in fact when programs are open sourced the reverse takes place on a much larger scale, some people will "borrow" code thats taken a long time to write and pretend its theirs and in some cases try to copyright the code, those looking to create exploits to annoy network users spend days weeks or months seeking out bugs and waste the time and momentum of those creating the actual work, this is not fiction but fact, the developer is then forced to park up all of the planned improvements and new ideas and instead fix endless minor issues that some half wit feels it is their duty to expose/inflict on the rest of the userbase as a "public service", this includes not just abusing exploits but rewriting the open src software to create further holes in some way.

The bottom line is simply this in my book, whom will create the new code given that they dont seem to have written anything else just yet ? It is no use stating someone will undertake a job by constant allusion, as posted above.
if there really is someone out there with the correct skills perhaps they will demonstrate them for us by creating their own third party client that follows the FOPNU protocol and put my concerns to bed, failing this test I dont care to trust anyone blindly with such code, the moral case is clear, one man pulls the cart while others feast off the bread it carries and offer no help bar to tell the cart puller he should share out all his bread so others can copy his effort.

Enrich themselves? I honestly don’t think there’s money to make with a P2P app when there are free alternatives with lots of users already.

Granted, many devs left the P2P world and moved on to mobile development and the heyday of P2P is behind us but still, if you’re work is worthwhile you will get contributions. That’s the reality as the AUTHORS file of gtk-gnutella or of the Help > About dialog of several apps mentioned above clearly show.


The commit history of a public repo and a copyleft license are a good protection against that.

Why anyone try to contribute to fopnu knowing full well it’s proprietary? More importantly, how would they do that? There’s no code repository to take a look at and the protocol is undocumented whereas other projects offer code repositories, bug and enhancement request trackers, wikis, IRC channels, instructions on how to contribute and so on? So rather than beg and wait folks willing to contribute are much more likely to go play with something much more welcoming, and which also has much more users (i.e. their contributions would have more impact).

Put simply, because of network effects the userbase of a P2P program is of critical importance (more users, more files shared, which brings in more users...). Getting included in free software operating system repositories, having more translations, giving the users the assurance that the app is clean and secure (not just by saying so but by letting anyone willing and capable to check the code) are important in this regard. In other words fopnu, as a new P2P protocol, will be facing a difficult chicken and egg problem and being open source can only be helpful.

Finally authors matter and the decision regarding the license belongs to the developer of course. That being said, especially in the P2P world where copyright is a subject of debate, IMHO it makes sense to use a copyleft license as a matter of coherence.

I think this programmers track record speaks for itself.


- WinMX: 17-18 years later is still used and enjoyed by many. Maybe even enjoyed too much still for a lot of the users to switch over to anything new unless it almost mirror images what they are used to.

- Tixati: Not as old, but is also trusted and used by a large number of users.

Personally i think open sourcing would not help this programmer whatsoever. He's clearly very accomplished and more hands would likely just get in the way. 7 new versions since July 28th, so basically August. Not a lot of "waiting" or "begging" in my opinion, nor has there been any that i've seen. :)

Conclusion: 2 previous largely successful programs (winmx 2.1 million users in its prime) (tixati very popular) without open-source. I think people have their own agendas when enquiring about things being open-source.

Forgive me for stating the obvious but whos going to create all the documentation etc that your implying creates itself by magic if you open src something ?

We both know the initial developer is the poor soul whos going to have the current work in hand derailed and more than once each time some tool feels they have a duty to show us an exploit that they will demand is fixed pronto, that is the reality, we saw the same with gnutella and winmx , as soon as someone knows all the inner working you can kiss the prime developer goodbye, his time is just not for wasting and we are then left with a half completed work that falls into further disrepair each time some new annoyance comes along, sure other developers can come along but then trap number two falls into place , no one knows them and folks start hearing whispers of backdoors etc, this is not something thats not happened many times including with open src programs, the developer pools are pretty shallow and thus until theres an issue lets see where this project leads,  the developer is listening to us and open to ideas, and is certainly trusted by many unlike most other new p2p app creators, a good pedigree is something you have to earn, new names with no history of writing excellent code are quite often shunned, after all why take the risk.

The problem is that because it isn't open source, anything could be hidden in it. One day they could add malware or anything and we just wouldn't know about it.

Unless your an observant coder anything could be buried in code anyway, did you forget the SSL scandal with the deliberately weakened keys ?

Reputation is pretty much everything when it comes to trusting a developer, KH has an unblemished reputation going back over 17 years, I think we trust this guy, it might be fun to indulge in the old "what if" playing-to-paranoia games but a decent track record speaks louder than playing devils advocate, the reality of solid reliable development trumps any fantasy.

As was posted above if "concerned" folks are so desperate for the src why not offer to purchase it, or are we simply seeing all the cheap shots as a way to get something for nothing, two years work is two years work, its not something trivial to dispense with and I feel repeatedly asking for it is completely disrespecting the developer.

So since you keep talking about the dev working on this for 2 years over and over.. What exactly will it take for the dev to make this code open source to the community? Ever thought of finding different/other ways to make money off of this?  Ever thought that if you had to publish this code on github that you will get a lot of respect from the dev community and maybe even get asked to work on projects that can make you an income?

Whats funny is, you have a "Donate" button on the top right of this site, yet you hide the code.  Donations will only happen if you freely distribute the code so that you can have the people's trust.  Do you think you will get more donations and respect when you hide or when you are transparent?

I agree with the other users on here that if you do open source this project, you will get more devs in the community to make the code more robust and secure, and earn the trust of the people who will gladly use this software. Right now, no one knows what you have hidden behind Fopnu.  People must just trust you? Doesnt work like that.
Right now, the only people who will be using Fopnu, are the usual blind-sighted people that would gladly invite anything on their computer these days.

I take offence at folks who talk down to others as you do SKO, I know fully well how to rip this C++ program apart and how and what to check for in terms of backdoors and other unwanted functions, unlike you perhaps this isnt the first rodeo I have been to and I sure as heck dont like folks who dont even know who the developer is let alone what makes him tick coming here to talk down to anyone who installs and uses Fopnu who does know the long and trusted history.

I can promise you one thing from my wealth of knowledge of this particular developer, you will not see any open src and the more you demand it the more he will simply ignore you, this guy does it for fun and to pay for the infrastructure he asks simply for a small peice of change, something we can all help with if we are so concerned about this new network, I see the same thing all around the web when it comes to developers facing a mob whom simply want the developers hard work but put in no effort themselves and are too miserly to even donate to the network at this current time, do we trust the guy we know is a safe pair of hands or a load of folks who we dont know cant trust and are in some cases too arrogant to comprehend that they are not the most powerful brain on the planet and whom end up destroying the network with their bug ridden additions, if they where such powerful minds they would after all develop their own network and spend their own time doing good things for others, perhaps folks demanding the src being made open should let the rest of us know just what they personally have given to the public for free and then we can see where they are coming from.

Theres so many of these open source requests it almost makes you wonder if they're Movie/Music industry spys looking for an easy way in to disrupt this new network o.O

Been reading this thread until i noticed the last comment, wow... that was unexpected. Like the music/movie industry would need to wait for you to open source it so that they can 'attack' Fopnu? lmao!  As if being open source makes you vulnerable or something? lol