The internet is an extraordinary tool, but its availability in some regions leaves much to be desired. From the lack of infrastructure to the classic censorship, there are millions of people out there who cannot access basic connectivity resources. Fortunately, the Internet-in-a-Box project allows us to create "learning hotspots" using a Raspberry Pi or another Linux-based device, loaded with the best open source and free content the web has to offer.
In early 2015, we discussed the Weekly Package, a collection of digital material distributed in Cuban territory as a "replacement" for traditional internet. In essence, it is one of the main examples of sneakernet in the world: if infrastructure does not exist or the cost of bandwidth is too high, the most effective solution is to share data and move it physically.
However, the Internet-in-a-Box project offers a sort of middle ground. Instead of duplicating disks and pendrives, its strategy is to create a fully loaded offline mini-server that also acts as a hotspot. In this way, anyone with a device that supports WiFi can connect to Internet-in-a-Box directly, without downloading or transferring anything.
How to Install Internet-in-a-Box
There are two installation paths offered by Internet-in-a-Box. The first is a Raspberry Pi compatible image. The wiki recommends using Raspberry Pi Imager and adding the Internet-in-a-Box repository manually so it appears in the list of options. The image is available in three editions: Medium with desktop (the .img is 12 GB), Small (.img of 7.1 GB), and Medical (.img of 4.9 GB). Depending on the Raspberry Pi model, Internet-in-a-Box supports between 10 and 32 simultaneous clients.
The second option is to use a Debian-based Linux environment. If you are using Ubuntu 22.04+, Linux Mint 21+ or Debian 11+, the developers offer a single installation command, "curl iiab.io/install.txt | bash". In all cases, Internet-in-a-Box recommends using an Ethernet connection during this phase, and avoiding a 5 GHz WiFi link to not affect compatibility with older equipment.
To conclude, the best way to experience Internet-in-a-Box is through its online demos (i.e., what each user sees when connecting to the hotspot), and one of them comes from Mexico. Its official page presents content from Khan Academy, Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, PhET, Wiktionary and Wikiquote, educaLAB, WikiHow, Project Gutenberg, and much more. Perhaps Internet-in-a-Box is not an ideal solution, but if connectivity is noticeably absent, we have a very solid alternative here.
Official site: Click here
Online demo: Click here
