alt.hn

4/2/2026 at 6:15:19 PM

Yggdrasil Network

 https://yggdrasil-network.github.io/

by Velocifyer

4/2/2026 at 7:47:34 PM

Thank you, Yggdrasil, for being just a compact routing scheme, not a semi-governmental military solution for implementing horrors beyond my comprehesion (they just love nordic or lotr names for that kind of things)

by postsantum

4/2/2026 at 8:07:16 PM

ootl: what's the deal with hereditary purists and authoritarians appropriating nordic symbolism as dogwhistles?

by xeonmc

4/2/2026 at 9:54:21 PM

It's where all of western history comes from so it's not very strange to be popular overall. It's not like us mythology is a thing.

by johanneskanybal

4/2/2026 at 10:01:41 PM

All of Western history comes from the Nordic countries? News to me.

by xhevahir

4/4/2026 at 11:44:59 PM

No just saying us history is a 200 year thing europe history is counted in millienias, that's not really debatable. In this post it was noridc mythology but it's was all pretty mixed up together and influenced by each other since they where trading and fighting with each other. But that wasn't really the point.

by johanneskanybal

4/3/2026 at 1:04:50 AM

this commenter seems to have forgotten hellenistic greece or a little empire called... Rome? lmao

by gucci_breakfast

4/2/2026 at 10:18:00 PM

>It's not like us mythology is a thing.

It was before "Americans" came along.

by krapp

4/3/2026 at 5:20:16 AM

Not really, it's just that the Americans and their culture got eradicated for the most part by the invaders/colonialists.

by bulbar

4/3/2026 at 7:46:42 AM

I think that that's exactly what the person you replied to was saying.

by gob_blob

4/3/2026 at 7:57:56 PM

Maybe they shouldn't have let so many illegal immigrants in.

by throwawaypath

4/2/2026 at 8:11:25 PM

The Nazis were obsessed with a fictional occult quasi-mythology of the "Aryan" race that heavily appropriated Norse mythology and symbolism. The SS symbol was a pair of sun runes for instance.

I think they appropriate Tolkien (who despised the Nazis and their corruption of "Germanic" ideals and Norse mythology) because a lot of them are nerds who don't read too deeply into it, like how right-wingers and conservatives enjoy Star Trek while being completely oblivious to its progressive ideology.

by krapp

4/2/2026 at 9:20:02 PM

Venkat Rao noticed this and turned it into a rather excellent essay: https://contraptions.venkateshrao.com/p/discworld-rules

> The Lord of the Rings is a great story, but I have to say, I’ve never understood the strange hold it seems to have on the imagination of a particular breed of technologists.

> As a story it’s great. It is pure fantasy of course (in the Chiang’s Law sense of being about special people rather than strange rules), full of Chosen Ones doing Great Man (or Great Hobbit) things. As an extended allegory for society and technology it absolutely sucks and is also ludicrously wrong-headed. Humorless Chosen people presiding grimly over a world in terminal decline, fighting Dark Lords, playing out decline-and-fall scripts to which there is no alternative, no Plan B.

by Arubis

4/2/2026 at 10:01:00 PM

Thank you for the link, that was a great essay and now I need to reread the Discworld novels.

by EdwardDiego

4/2/2026 at 10:08:38 PM

Ah, the nerds, always itching to build the Torment Nexus from the classic novel Don't Build the Torment Nexus.

by throw-the-towel

4/2/2026 at 8:18:46 PM

It's not hard to imagine what elf-rights were thinking of humans. Perhaps they even had a slur or two

by postsantum

4/2/2026 at 8:22:56 PM

Definitely for the dark elves.

by krapp

4/2/2026 at 10:06:23 PM

I thought the name is a Max Payne reference.

by cluckindan

4/2/2026 at 7:50:49 PM

Earlier discussions:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42155780

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42158609

by mitchbob

4/2/2026 at 8:19:11 PM

Thanks! Macroexpanded:

True P2P Email on Top of Yggdrasil Network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46080143 - Nov 2025 (38 comments)

Yggdrasil Network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44337902 - June 2025 (4 comments)

Yggdrasil is an experimental compact routing scheme that is fully decentralised - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43921624 - May 2025 (53 comments)

Yggdrasil Network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42155780 - Nov 2024 (106 comments)

Yggdrasil Network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41669625 - Sept 2024 (3 comments)

Yggdrasil P2P mesh E2EE IPv6 network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30156551 - Jan 2022 (77 comments)

Yggdrasil – Early-stage implementation of an end-to-end encrypted IPv6 network - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27577201 - June 2021 (102 comments)

Show HN: Yggdrasil Network – compact mesh routing experiment for mesh networks - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18863554 - Jan 2019 (15 comments)

Announcing Yggdrasil Network v0.3 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18751991 - Dec 2018 (3 comments)

Yggdrasil: End-To-end Encrypted IPv6 Networking - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18666245 - Dec 2018 (1 comment)

by dang

4/2/2026 at 11:37:38 PM

Note that Yggdrasil Linux/GNU/X (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43923380) is unrelated to this project. That project is a GNU/Linux distro; this is a userspace overlay network.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 2:11:30 AM

Oops! Cut now.

by dang

4/2/2026 at 7:51:50 PM

It's been working well for me as a kind of poor-man's tailscale, connecting several VPS and several laptops.

by realreality

4/2/2026 at 11:42:34 PM

I considered using Tailscale, but at the end of the day Yggdrasil is more inspiring to me. I like the idea of a network with no central authority delegating addresses. I hope that it takes off beyond just an overlay network. I'd be curious to try running it directly over some physical link without IP. Imagine if the world ran on something like Yggdrasil: anyone could plug in and get a publicly routable address. I think it would be great for decentralization and the open internet.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 2:17:03 AM

I share that sentiment. I've thought about combining yggdrasil with garage to create a sort of plug-and-play distributed storage pool shared with a trusted circle.

Though I wonder if the network routing would break down beyond a certain scale, or if it can be resilient against attacks. I don't know enough about the inner workings to be determine the weak points.

by realreality

4/3/2026 at 7:56:42 AM

> Imagine if the world ran on something like Yggdrasil: anyone could plug in and get a publicly routable address.

Mmh, I heard that one before... It's one of the main points for ipv6 ( ･ั ﹏ ･ั )

by ffsm8

4/3/2026 at 11:46:35 AM

yes exactly, that's why yggdrasil uses ipv6

by mishmish66

4/3/2026 at 9:30:36 PM

Yes, except IPv6 still has central authorities, no? I can't just generate an identity, connect to a peer and be on the global network right?

by MarsIronPI

4/2/2026 at 8:29:59 PM

Does anyone run private services for themselves on Yggdrasil by allowlisting specific IPs and piggybacking on the routing layer? I've thought about doing this but haven't tried it.

I wish TLS behaved better with private networks but I around certificates continues to mostly be oriented around the Internet.

by Karrot_Kream

4/2/2026 at 10:02:59 PM

Yes. All you have to do is whitelist your clients' yggdrasil addresses in your firewall.

in pf syntax:

  table <yggdrasil> persist file "/etc/yggdrasil-allowed"

  pass in quick on tun0 inet6 proto tcp from <yggdrasil> to port $services

by realreality

4/2/2026 at 10:56:09 PM

Have you had issues with bad actors flooding you? And how are your routes (when you're stationary?) Just curious

by Karrot_Kream

4/2/2026 at 11:45:44 PM

I actually don't have firewalls set up on my devices that run Yggdrasil yet (please don't crack me). I haven't noticed any brute-force attacks on my SSH servers yet. Though I really should set up firewalls.

As for routing, I run my own node on a VPS, so all my edge devices are peered with that machine so routing is fine. Though when my machines are on the same network they automatically peer with each other directly.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 2:27:07 AM

I haven't noticed any bad actor traffic. Perhaps yggdrasil is still too obscure to bother attacking.

The stationary nodes are connected to several public yggdrasil peers that are geographically close by. The routing "just works", though connecting to a peer can take a few seconds, at first.

by realreality

4/2/2026 at 11:39:40 PM

I don't run services on Yggdrasil yet, but I use it heavily to get static, publicly routable addresses for SSH purposes. It's very nice because Yggdrasil automatically finds peers on the local network, so my addresses still work for devices on the same local network, if there's no uplink.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 4:13:02 PM

Mesh Network Lab: Emulate routing of Babel, Batman, OLSR, BMX, Yggdrasil & CJDNS

https://github.com/mwarning

This project by mwarning42 is meant to test Mobile Ad-Hoc Mesh routing protocols. Out of the box supported are Babel, B.A.T.M.A.N.-adv, OLSR1, OLSR2, BMX6, BMX7, Yggdrasil and CJDNS.

by kls0e

4/2/2026 at 7:34:57 PM

Not to be confused with the Yggdrasil Linux distro.

(Sometimes being first doesn't help.)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil_Linux/GNU/X

by Animats

4/2/2026 at 8:13:53 PM

Yggdrasil was my first distro, but I was evaluating it and another one back to back. I ended up sticking with SLS until I got a RedHat Linux book with a CD in the back - at retail, in brick and mortar book store. The next couple were Caldera and Mandrake, this time in tidy cardboard boxes with multiple discs and multiple books each. I think I got those both at computer/electronics stores. The latency was high, but the bandwidth of driving home with 7 discs was hard to beat at the time.

by cestith

4/2/2026 at 7:30:15 PM

it’s been “new” fir as long as i have known about it, over 5 years or so? or is this a different thing?

by woleium

4/2/2026 at 7:34:01 PM

Doesn't look that active either. It unfortunately seems like there isn't a great use case for these networks that will adopt usage through the hurdles

by OsrsNeedsf2P

4/2/2026 at 8:09:02 PM

I don't recall the year but it was a long while ago, the developer and CJD from cjdns were chatting about ygg, very similar projects just different projects.

The point was to put routing and privacy at the foundation of "the internet"

It was mostly a response to the knowledge of prolific government and corporate spying. There are public nodes to piggyback on the legacy internet but it's another project that let's users build and control their own infrastructure, e.g. mesh-local

Also see CJDNS, darknet project and hyperboria

by pwndByDeath

4/2/2026 at 9:09:11 PM

Actually, could anyone compare this to cjdns? On the surface they seem pretty similar. Docs say:

> Yggdrasil was created in order to build a decentralised routing scheme for mesh networks that can potentially operate at a global scale, motivated in particular by significant performance and scaling issues that were present in cjdns at the time.

( https://yggdrasil-network.github.io/faq.html )

but that was a while back; where do they stand today?

by yjftsjthsd-h

4/3/2026 at 12:08:05 AM

I always thought of them as the same.basic idea, but CJD went on to make a network crypto thing that I never really understood.

Ygg and cjdns are the same from a cosmetic point of view just different developers.

IMO ygg is easy to install, cjdns was adding some new dev things that complicated the non developer experience, but that was a few years ago

by pwndByDeath

4/2/2026 at 7:55:34 PM

Tailscale somehow found use for self-hosters, despite being wildly unergonomic for an all-Linux, non-corporate, network. Yggdrasil lacks marketing effort, but is otherwise a great option.

by akho

4/2/2026 at 11:50:32 PM

I actually use Yggdrasil in lieu of Tailscale because I love the idea of a decentralized routing system.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 12:39:31 AM

I never understand why people enjoy having a centralized control plane.

by rubatuga

4/3/2026 at 2:16:19 AM

easier to implement and understand

by hnav

4/3/2026 at 4:31:37 AM

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but assuming you're not: Tailscale makes security easier because networks are private by default. To achieve a similar effect with Yggdrasil you'd have to use a firewall to whitelist the Yggdrasil IPs of all your devices. So it's more work to set up.

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 6:30:53 AM

You have to use a firewall anyway. If you use Tailscale, you have two firewalls, which is not strictly easier.

by akho

4/3/2026 at 9:29:39 PM

Huh? I thought one of the appeals of Tailscale is that security is done at the network level; plus that your network is private, so you don't get randos knocking at your ports.

by MarsIronPI

4/4/2026 at 8:32:14 AM

What does “at the network level” mean?..

Anyway; Tailscale is not your only network. If you’re on a laptop, you need to be able to log onto rando wifi networks. If you’re at home, you need to be mindful of your smart fridge going rogue. You need to run a firewall. Tailscale adds a separate, Tailscale-specific, firewall with centralized management. Now you have two firewalls.

by akho

4/4/2026 at 3:39:23 PM

Ah, I see what you mean now. Yes, that's true; you'd still need a firewall for LAN.

> What does “at the network level” mean?..

I meant the normal non-Tailscale firewall (e.g. iptables).

by MarsIronPI

4/3/2026 at 12:38:52 AM

I mean, it just had a release in Feb 2026, version 0.5.13.

by rubatuga

4/2/2026 at 9:00:50 PM

That is a remarkably content-free website. I tried (I think) all of the obvious pages, but still don't know in any detail, how do they handle routing differently from the normal internet.

Can anyone explain? They complain that routing on the internet is (somewhat) hierarchical to scale, but then don't explain their solution to the same problem(s).

The simplified choice has always been distance-vector, or link state. Are they a better attempt at one of these? Some new idea?

by lokar

4/2/2026 at 11:49:15 PM

The novelty is that routing is based on cryptographic identity. Yggdrasil's IPv6 addresses are actually truncated representations of public keys. You configure the Yggdrasil software with a list of peers which it connects to over normal internet, but then when you route a Yggdrasil address your device talks to all its peers, who talk to their peers and so on until they find your destination. As I understand it, they optimize it by caching the routing information and using bloom filters to find the appropriate peer.

by MarsIronPI

4/2/2026 at 10:10:31 PM

Picture this:

You have three devices at home, A, B and C. Only device A have Internet connection and can connect to public Yggdrasil node. B can connect only to A and C. C can connect only to B. Have Yggdrasil installed on all of them (and tell Yggdrasil about the peers), all devices would have access to full Yggdrasil network.

by mrsssnake

4/2/2026 at 10:18:10 PM

And? How is that novel? I read the site as saying the have a new, and better solution to how to do internet scale routing (in an overlay network, but that did not seem like a critical aspect)

by lokar

4/2/2026 at 10:08:12 PM

Was evaluating this recently, the lack of NAT busting was a dealbreaker.

by ajvs

4/2/2026 at 10:58:02 PM

You can make outbound connections to peers to avoid NAT.

by Karrot_Kream

4/3/2026 at 8:01:05 PM

yggdrasil-jumper aims to help with this

by rubatuga