CRXN documentation / What is it?

CRXN

What is it?

An image showing a mesh topology. The nodes are represented as points, which are connected by lines.

CRXN stands for Community Run eXpansive Network. It’s a computer network run by the community for the community. We provide an IPv6 (that’s the freshest Internet Protocol out there to date) and on CRXN anything that can speak IPv6 will be able to function correctly - a network without borders! We are focused with having a network that really focuses on the “end-to-end” principal of IP - that is to say that if you want to run something and make it available to other then you won’t have to worry about NAT-traversal, port forwarding, lack of raw IP support and all the other non-sense that IPv4 created (due to lack of addresses).

Compared to the clearnet (normal Internet) there isn’t much fuss involved around getting a network ID assigned to you and so forth, we truly are for the community and all our members take some of their own time to work on their network and the greater CRXN inter-network as a whole.

It’s a great place to test out new protocols, networking projects, play games, exchange ideas and learn about networking, routing and network sub-systems themselves. You also get to learn how CRXN is put together which is a great way to learn networking with those that run networks already themselves.

Our goals

The network has a few goals that we always want to maintain as to not lose our allure:

  1. Be a network for learning
    • We don’t want to shun people away from using some new routing protocol as it might be cool and interesting to learn
  2. Be reliable
    • Of course when learning people should also make sure their routers don’t just accept any route without making sure its valid - hence network operators should make sure their networks operate even when some are causing mayhem (malicious or learning by trial and error)
    • Also shouldn’t be painfully slow
  3. Diverse routing
    • We want to try out protocols like ospf, babel, bgp and so on and so forth
    • We want to build a network out of a mix and match of these all working in harmony together
    • Monocultures suck!
  4. Usable
    • We have DNS, we have voice chat servers and we have IRC (we even have gaming!) but we can always do with much much more!
    • We want the users, you, to make the network usable for your needs - who knows it might provide a service that helps out someone else
  5. Peering
    • We want people to setup redundant links using whatever protocols they want, be it wireguard, GRE, fastd etc.
    • We want there to be interesting links and diversity
  6. Chaos and Order
    • The network should never stop experimenting
    • But it should have 99% uptime and safety fallbacks
    • If you want to experiment - then go ahead and try cause as little disruption as possible
    • If you run a node - make it secure - sign routes etc. to prevent others from experimenting from messing your network up

We aim to create a more open Internet available to everyone and a place to learn about IP routing and networking in general.

We don’t use any particular tooling, the only thing that is standard is the IPv4 and IPv6 part. What tunnelling software, physical mediums or routing daemon you choose to use is up to you - this falls in line with our open ethos.

About the network

A few details about the network.

Protocol support

We only use IPv6 on CRXN because it has many features, such as link-local addresses, that make setting up dynamic routing protocols near-zero-config.

It’s also the modern way of the Internet and means you will get a large space of addresses assigned to you.

The range

The IPv6 range we use is the private range of fd00::/8.

Assignments

Users get allocated a /48 (like fdd2:cbf2:61bd::/48) IPv6 ULA within the fd00::/8 range (by definition).

We keep track of allocations on a Git-based repository called EntityDB.

Getting started

Joining the network

Does it sound interesting enough for you already? Want to get connected? Then head on over to our Getting started section where you can find all the guides you need in order to get connected, follow the rules and have fun!


Some important links to remember.