FAQ

How do I get started?

Head over to the Getting Started section for instructions on how to download and install the Radicle Upstream client.

How is collaborating on Radicle different than GitHub?

In contrast to centralized code collaboration platforms, Radicle is designed for bazaar-style collaboration. On the Radicle network, content is distributed peer-to-peer via a process called gossip. This means that peers are in control of their social interactions as they self-host their own content and the content of any peers they are interested in. This also means that within projects, there isn't a single master branch that contributors merge into. Each peer maintains a view of a project with their changesets and branches. These views are gossiped around to other peers that are interested in those changes. Read more about the implications and approach to this design here.

How is Radicle more secure than centralized platforms?

The Radicle network is peer-to-peer and built on public key cryptography. To start, this means that there is no need to rely on third parties to access or use the Radicle network. It is harder to take down because there is no central point of failure, and is resistant to corporate and state capture and censorship. In addition, all data on the Radicle network is cryptographically signed & verified as it's gossiped between peers. While centralized platforms rely on user interface components and key oracles to signal trust from user to user, Radicle has designed trust into the core of the protocol.

How does Radicle interact with Git?

Radicle Link — the protocol that powers the Radicle network is built on Git. All Radicle data is stored in a single Git monorepo on your machine that is read from and written to via the Upstream client. To read more about Radicle's Git Implementation, see How it Works.

How is Radicle licensed?

Radicle is completely free and open-source. It's licensed under version 3 of the GNU General Public License (GPLv3) with the Radicle Linking Exception. You can read more about how this license was chosen here.

How will issues and PRs work?

Social collaboration features (i.e. bug reports, patches, discussions etc...) are all on the Radicle roadmap. They will work very similarly to the experiences we have now, but will be local-first and cryptographically signed. This means issues, PRs, and discussions will be more secure, available offline, and stored on your machine as git objects — not on a central server!

When will CLI tooling be available?

We're working on it! 🤞 We will introduce CLI tooling alongside of Upstream development.

Can I backup a GitHub project on Radicle?

Yes! Publishing a codebase to Radicle is a great way to create a peer-to-peer backup of your repositories. Maintaining a mirror of a project on Radicle is as simple as pushing to another remote. Read more about creating projects.

Can I replace GitHub with Radicle?

If you want! While our Beta release will have only the basic collaboration features (i.e. code hosting, sharing, checking out, and pushing/pulling), we plan to introduce features that could support a similar day-to-day code collaboration experience to GitHub. They will include bug reporting, patches, code review, and discussions.

That being said, while we believe that reducing one's reliance on centrally-hosted platforms is generally a good idea, we also believe that code collaboration solutions serve different purposes for different people. Radicle Upstream will support social collaboration, but it's priority will be delivering secure, local-first, peer-to-peer code collaboration — not an exact GitHub replica.

Where is my data stored?

On the Radicle network, content is distributed peer-to-peer via a process called gossip. This means that peers self-host their own content — and the content of any peers they are interested in — locally on their machine in a Git monorepo. It also means that whenever your data is published to the network, it can be replicated and stored on another peer's machine.

Can I create private repositories on Radicle?

No, not yet - but in the future! Private projects with end-to-end encryption are on our roadmap. In the meantime, be sure to note that everything you put on Radicle will be publicly available.

What is a remote?

A remote refers to a version of your project that is maintained by another person. To collaborate with others on Radicle, you have to add and follow other their remotes to be able to fetch changes from them. You can manage remotes on your project page (See Adding Remotes). For more on how remote repositories work, see the Git documentation.

What's a Radicle ID?

A Radicle ID is a unique way of identifying projects in the Radicle Network. You can find it on a project's page or on the seed node dashboard. You use a project's Radicle ID to find it via Radicle Upstream.

What's a Device ID?

A Device ID is the encoding of a peer's public key that is tied to a specific device. People will be able to manage multiple Device IDs in the future, but for now you can only have one Device ID per identity.

To be added as a remote to a project, you need to share your Device ID.

What does following mean in Radicle?

Following a project replicates its data to your machine by tracking it. This allows the follower to subscribe to updates from the project's maintainer(s) or other remotes. It is also a way to signal interest in the project or peer by further replicating the data across their network, making it available to other people on the network. See Tracking.

Can I use Radicle with multiple devices?

Yes and no. While there isn't multi-device support yet, you can still create accounts on different devices, they just won't be linked under one Upstream user account.

How do I make sure nobody else has my display name?

You can't.... yet. We will be introducing unique names soon 👍

(P.S. While your display name isn't unique, your emoji avatar is!)

What happens if I forget my passphrase?

Without your passphrase, there is no way to grant the Upstream client access to your secret key. This means that without your passphrase, there is no way to access or publish data to the Radicle network - so make sure you keep it safe!

Can I change my passphrase?

Not yet — so make sure to keep it in a safe place!

Why do I have to enter my passphrase everytime?

Interactions through Git and the remote helper are ad-hoc and don't have the benefit of a long-running daemon - i.e. Upstream client. That means for now the passphrase has to be provided every time you interact with Radicle outside of a client.

I can't find a project on the network or see a peer's changes. What should I do?

First, check to see if you are connected to the seed node by hovering over the Connection Status icon in your toolbar. If you are connected to one or more peer, navigate to the seed node dashboard (e.g. seedling.radicle.xyz) to see if you can find your Device ID.

Seed Dashboard Search

If you are connected to the seed node and can find yourself on the dashboard, try restarting the app. On restart, if there is still outstanding data to be found, try refreshing the app. Wait one minute before restarting the app again.

If you are still running into problems, please submit a request in our #support channel.

Can I delete a project?

Currently, this feature is not supported but it is on the roadmap and will be included in an upcoming release. Until then, you can only remove your project from your local machine, thus limiting the number of peers who can find and replicate your project. You can not delete a project from another peer's local machine, as they retain control over their local data.

Why am I only connected to one peer?

By default, the Upstream client is conecting to a seed node operated by Radicle. While we support epidemic broadcast to find and connect to other peers, we don't have support for hole punching just yet, which will prevent a stable conenction between two computers.

I ran into a issue, where can I report it?

Please reach out to us in our #support channel, or submit an issue on our GitHub repository.

I need some help, where do I reach out?

For help, join our #support channel in our Matrix chat or in the Help category of our Discourse.

How do I join your Matrix channel?

To join our Matrix chat, follow these steps:

To join our Matrix chat with an account from another Matrix server, you can use this direct invite link to join #general. For more information on our community channels see Join our Community.

Can I run Radicle as a daemon?

While technically possible, we haven't bundled it yet in a convenient package for anyone to run in the background. We are working hard to change that so we can help people operate Radicle nodes in many different ways. Should you be keen to have it as a daemon right now, check out how the seed is implemented, and try to run your own.

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