Arjen
ddb9a8336a
`transports.udp.<name>.interface` binds the instance's listen socket, and the per-peer connected sockets under it, to the named interface: Linux `SO_BINDTODEVICE` in both directions, macOS `IP_BOUND_IF` / `IPV6_BOUND_IF` for egress only (inbound on a wildcard bind still arrives from any interface there). Elsewhere naming an interface is an error at start rather than a silent no-op. One fd-based helper in `io/bind_device.rs` serves both sockets, so the two cannot drift. Without the connected-socket half, an interface-bound instance's data routed by the kernel's table and could leave by another NIC, which made the binding a lie; with it, two instances bound to two interfaces are two distinct paths to a peer reachable over both. The interface must exist when the daemon starts: unlike an Ethernet transport, an interface-bound UDP instance is not retried when its interface appears later, and it gets no presence or carrier signal while running. That is documented rather than fixed here.
FIPS Documentation
FIPS (Free Internetworking Peering System) is a self-organizing encrypted mesh network built on Nostr identities, capable of operating over arbitrary transports — local networks, the public internet, Tor, Bluetooth, or point-to-point links — without central infrastructure.
With FIPS, your machine becomes a node in the mesh with a self-generated cryptographic identity. There are two ways to deploy it.
As an overlay on top of existing IP networks, FIPS lets your node reach any other FIPS node wherever it sits — behind a NAT, on a different ISP, on a phone over cellular, on a laptop with only Bluetooth in range, or behind a Tor onion. The mesh forwards IPv6 traffic transparently and end-to-end encrypted, with no central VPN concentrator or coordinating server.
From the ground up over raw Ethernet, WiFi, or Bluetooth, FIPS provides a complete permissionless network without any pre-existing IP infrastructure, ISP, or DNS. Any node that joins the link gets routable IPv6 addresses, peer discovery, and a path to every other node automatically.
Either way, existing networking software runs over it unchanged: SSH, HTTP servers, file transfer, anything IPv6-native works the same way it would on a local network.
New to FIPS? Start with the Getting Started guide.
Documentation Sections
Tutorials
If you are starting from scratch and want a guided path to a working mesh, go here.
How-To Guides
If you have a specific task in mind — enabling a feature, deploying a component, diagnosing a problem — go here.
Reference
If you need to look up wire formats, configuration keys, command flags, or counter inventories, go here.
Design
If you want to understand how the mesh self-organizes, why FIPS makes the choices it does, or how the pieces fit together, go here.
Releases
If you want the notes for a particular version — what changed, what broke, and what to do about it on upgrade — go here.