About twister-core

twister-core is the primary twister networking application, released by Miguel Freitas in 2013.

According to the original README:

User registration and authentication is provided by a bitcoin-like network, so it is completely decentralized (does not depend on any central authority).
Post distribution uses kademlia DHT network and bittorrent-like swarms, both are provided by libtorrent.
Both Bitcoin and libtorrent versions included here are highly patched and do not interoperate with existing networks (on purpose).

Conception

The software design uses proof-of-work (PoW) to permanently store usernames (public keys) and message indexes in the blockchain. Mining is not required to create a new account; it is performed by service nodes that support the network by generating promotional messages. Also, the blockchain does not provide any coins for trading; it is solely used to offer decentralized storage for the network's usernames and messaging metadata.

To keep the blockchain as small as possible, all data exchanges occur over the BitTorrent protocol, using a modified version of the libtorrent library; this library is implemented as the local component of twister-core.

For more technical details about twister design, please read the original whitepaper

Development status

According to the announcement, on June 25, 2020, official project maintenance was discontinued, but the network remains active as it does not require centralized servers. Since 2021, development has been maintained by the community.

Requirements

• CPU architectures: amd64, armhf
• RAM: 512 Mb
• Disk: ~1Gb
  • build with dependencies: 529 Mb
  • profile data: ~512 Mb in 2025 (depending on subscriptions)
• Bandwidth: depends on the network activity, at this moment - about 2 Gb per month

User interface

Since twister-core has no GUI out of the box, it requires a web UI application called twister-html to interact using a web browser.

Install options

The simplest way to get started is to use the latest Flatpak bundle. To build from source, you will want to follow the instructions, depending on your system.