The latest version of the code in the google code repository works as of today (July 19, 2011) as expected, on the latest release of Ubuntu (11.04). It is untested on other platforms. "As expected" means that the functions that have been implemented work as described, but the software is not complete.
The future: I have plans for pieces of this codebase, but whether the flud project itself survives going forward is an open question.
The remainder of this page (below) exists for historical purposes. The repositories for packaged versions of flud are out of date. Please visit the flud google code projects page for working versions of the code.
flŭd backup is experimental software, and still in early stages of development. The current release is not suitable for reliably backing up data, and the public flŭd network (which is needed to reap the benefits of flŭd's decentralized architecture) does not yet exist.
Nevertheless, you may find this release (version 0.2.1, the sixth public release) of flŭd sufficient for doing trial backups to other computers under your own control or under the control of people you trust.
This release is also suitable for running emulated flud networks.
Release Notes for this release are available.
Despite flŭd's experimental status, you may also find this release FREAKIN' SWEET! and EXTREME ELITE TO THE nTH DEGREE! See screenshots here.
Finally, basic testing is always appreciated. You can report problems to the flud-devel mailing list or via the bug tracker.
RPM packages are available for Fedora Core 8, and deb packages for Ubuntu/Debian. Source rpms and tarball installation is also available (anyone submitting packages for other platforms will be thankfully credited).
flŭd now installs via APT repository. Add 'deb http://flud.org/debian gutsy main' to /etc/apt/sources.list (if you would rather not edit sources.list by hand, you can go to System->Administration->Software_Sources, select the 'Third-Party Software' tab, click on the 'Add' button, and add the above line).
Once added to sources.list,
apt-get update
apt-get install flud should install flŭd and any necessary
dependencies (installation via synaptic also works).
For other Debian-based distros, you can create your own debs (highly recommended).
flŭd now installs via YUM. The easiest way to add the flud repository to your system is to:
rpm -Uvh http://flud.org/yum/flud-release-1.0-1.noarch.rpm
yum install flud
Any necessary dependencies should get picked up in the process.
For other RPM-based distros, you can create your own RPMs (highly recommended).
You can also install flud directly from tarballs. Download pyutil tarball, argparse tarball, zfec tarball, and flud tarball.
and then simply issuepython setup.py install
as root in each tarball's root directory.
(Note that if you use ez_setup.py instead of setup.py in zfec, you may be able to avoid manually downloading and installing pyutil and argparse)
The most current svn snapshot of flud is available at github.
(Note: if you want to hack on flud, this is the best method. But you may want to first follow the above instructions to install via deb/rpms/tarballs in order to make sure you've got all the dependencies, and then start working from git).
If you have any trouble with these packages, please post a question to the flud-devel mailing list or send me an email directly.
Once installed, you should be able to run a flŭd node to check out basic functionality.
You can also experiment with emulating flud networks.