GNUnet 0.21.0 released

[Schanzenbach, Martin]

We are pleased to announce the release of GNUnet 0.21.0.
GNUnet is an alternative network stack for building secure, 
decentralized and privacy-preserving distributed applications. Our goal 
is to replace the old insecure Internet protocol stack. Starting from an 
application for secure publication of files, it has grown to include all 
kinds of basic protocol components and applications towards the creation 
of a GNU internet.

This release marks a noteworthy milestone in that it includes a 
completely new transport layer. It lays the groundwork for fixing some 
major design issues and may also already alleviate a variety of issues 
seen in previous releases related to connectivity. This change also 
deprecates our testbed and ATS subsystem.

This is a new major release. It breaks protocol compatibility with the 
0.20.x versions. Please be aware that Git master is thus henceforth (and 
has been for a while) INCOMPATIBLE with the 0.20.x GNUnet network, and 
interactions between old and new peers will result in issues. In terms 
of usability, users should be aware that there are still a number of 
known open issues in particular with respect to ease of use, but also 
some critical privacy issues especially for mobile users. Also, the 
nascent network is tiny and thus unlikely to provide good anonymity or 
extensive amounts of interesting information. As a result, the 0.21.0 
release is still only suitable for early adopters with some reasonable 
pain tolerance.

Download links:

http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/gnunet/gnunet-0.21.0.tar.gz
http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/gnunet/gnunet-gtk-0.21.0.tar.gz
http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/gnunet/gnunet-fuse-0.21.0.tar.gz

The GPG key used to sign is: 3D11063C10F98D14BD24D1470B0998EF86F59B6A

Note that due to mirror synchronization, not all links might be 
functional early after the release. For direct access try 
http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/gnunet/

Changes:

A detailed list of changes can be found in the git log, the NEWS and the 
bug tracker.

Known Issues:

    - There are known major design issues in the CORE subsystems which 
will need to be addressed in the future to achieve acceptable usability, 
performance and security.
    - There are known moderate implementation limitations in CADET that 
negatively impact performance.
    - There are known moderate design issues in FS that also impact 
usability and performance.
    - There are minor implementation limitations in SET that create 
unnecessary attack surface for availability.
    - The RPS subsystem remains experimental.

In addition to this list, you may also want to consult our bug tracker 
at https://bugs.gnunet.org/ which lists about 190 more specific issues.

Thanks:

This release was the work of many people. The following people 
contributed code and were thus easily identified: Christian Grothoff, 
t3sserakt, TheJackiMonster, Pedram Fardzadeh, dvn, Sebastian Nadler and 
Martin Schanzenbach.