
Show HN: Witness – A Web Application Using IPFS and Ethereum - jonasbostoen
https://witnessdb.com
======
jonasbostoen
What’s up HackerNews! The last couple of months (as a coding project), we have
been working on this web application that leverages Ethereum and IPFS to allow
users to create permanent links to files. We wanted to provide an entry level
dashboard, where people could really use Ethereum as well as IPFS, so that
they could see that it doesn’t have to be so difficult to do something useful
with it.

How it works: the short version
([https://witnessdb.com/about](https://witnessdb.com/about) for the long
version)

So on the webpage, you can upload a file together with your Ethereum address.
We will then be storing that file, either until correct payment is made to our
Ethereum address or until the expiry date, which is one hour later. When
either of the 2 is triggered, the file and all corresponding metadata is
deleted, except for the logs we keep for a week, to resolve any errors.

If payment is made, our IPFS node adds the file to IPFS, gets the CID of that
file, sends that back to our Ethereum node and the node signs a transaction,
with the CID as input data, to send it back to you. This creates a permanent
link, and, since we use multiple pinning services beside our own server,
almost permanent uptime. If, for example, one of the IPFS nodes falls away,
there will be others. And if they all fall away, all one has to do is upload
and host the same file on IPFS again, and, since the files are content
addressed, the same link, that was included in the Ethereum blockchain, will
work again.

If you have any questions, advice, or anything else, feel free to comment or
to contact us at witnessdb@protonmail.com.

We hope you like it.

