Bitcoin Forum

Namecoin, being quite an old cryptocurrency, provides the ability to register domain names within the Blockchain. This provides a certain level of censorship-resistance to websites, as governments cannot censor access to the domain itself. Even Ethereum has its own domain name system called "Ethereum Naming Service" (ENS). On the PC, it's quite easy to access .bit and .eth sites by installing an extension for your browser. But on mobile devices like smartphones and tablets, that's another story.

I've been trying to connect to .bit sites within my Android smartphone without any luck so far. I was wondering if there was a workaround for this, since I cannot install browser extensions that would allow me to access .bit sites with ease. Maybe it's possible to change DNS servers to Namecoin nodes? Will that work?

Any help with this will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance. :)

What browser extension are you referring to? A name would at least help, on Android phones mozilla firefox supports browser extensions  extensions think you should try it out, maybe you will find solution to what you are seeking for

Have you ever tried using VPN? It may solve your problem? Due to a number of restrictions on the many websites I can access from a PC in my country of residence, I only need to use VPN when I visiting from mobile.

Keep aside the shitposts which doesn't have a meaning to your question, I don't think there is a way for you to connect to .bit (namecoin based site) without an NMControl and I further believe that the latter idea (of changing DNS to point to the Namecoin servers) you have mentioned wouldn't even work. That's probably because most of these nodes/servers are primarily designed to be used in a computer environment rather in a mobile based environment.

Though I have never used a namecoin server actually, but all I can advise you is to have a remote connection to your laptop and do the work which the mobile is intended to do. This should be the easier way for you to access .bit sites from a mobile environment and with having NMControl installed in your PC. Also do note that, these NMControl require a namecoin full node to be run always which can never be achieved in a mobile interface.

P.S Your topics (Ethereum Mixer, using crypto at gas stations, this) in this frog pondAltcoin Discussion seems to be really good!

I'm referring to an extension such as "PeerName" which allows you to visit .bit websites on your PC anytime using the Chrome web browser. I didn't knew it was possible to use extensions on the mobile version of FireFox, so I'll give this a try. The decentralized web needs applications for mobile devices to provide convenience for people on the go. With a DNS resolver for .bit domains, and even .eth domains for mobile devices, people can surf decentralized websites without the need to use a computer ever. I'd sometimes which that the SAFE Network, and ZeroNet would be accessible easily within my mobile device. But devs have focused only on desktop versions of the same, which proves to be inconvenient for people looking to access alternative networks from any mobile device.

In my opinion, .bit websites are much more resilient against censorship than sites which rely on traditional top-level domains such as .com, .org, and .net. It's even much cheaper to buy a .bit domain name too. Namecoin did it once, and now Ethereum is starting to introduce this with its "Ethereum Name Service (ENS)". Whenever this will become a viral way of accessing websites in the future, its yet to be seen. :)



Yes. I've tried using VPN but haven't got any luck so far. What I truly need is a DNS resolver that would work with .bit domains. Perhaps, setting the IP addresses of Namecoin nodes under DNS servers might do the trick? I'm testing out different ways on how to achieve said purpose without the need to rely on a computer at all times. It would be great to not only access .bit websites on your mobile device, but also .eth sites and other decentralized domain names provided by alternative blockchain networks. This is the future of the Internet, which could prove to decentralized the web if successful. Not many people are aware of censorship-resistant sites which make use of .bit domains yet. But when they do, expect worldwide governments to take every action possible in order to prevent people from accessing the decentralized Internet.

In my opinion this is a big problem that people can't access easily .bit TLDs. The "Peername" plugin is only a temporal solution.  :-\

Agree. This greatly reduces the level of adoption for decentralized domains on the Blockchain among people in the mainstream world. Installing the mobile version of Firefox just to get the "Peername" extension to access ".bit" sites is not very convenient if you tell me. Devs would need to work on a straightforward process for people to easily view "TLDs" on the decentralized web. Maybe someday, we'll get to see a mobile web browser with a built-in resolver for ".bit" domains. The Namecoin blockchain is not that popular though, but someone could develop something like this in the future if the need arises.

At least, the workaround of using Firefox mobile with "Peername" works. It may be all we need to access ".bit" sites during the meantime. Besides, there are other decentralized blockchain domains like ".eth" and ".nxt" which serve the same purpose as Namecoin's ".bit" TLDs. If one of the other blockchains get a mobile browser capable of resolving decentralized domains with ease, one could easily port it to the NMC blockchain. A truly decentralized web will compose of decentralized domains, an alternative network like ZeroNet, and smart contracts. It'll be practically impossible for governments or other third parties to censor sites which are rely on said infrastructure. I believe that we're still early to see websites living on the decentralized web, but anything is possible. In the meantime, I'll continue to surf ".bit" sites on my computer with either "Peername" or the "dotbitme" extension until something better comes up for mobile devices. :)