> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.neova.io/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.neova.io/introduction.md).

# Introduction

## A private cloud you can open on Monday morning

Most files still live with a handful of cloud vendors. The product is easy. The terms are theirs: one datacenter, their keys, their outage. When that infrastructure stops, the files stop with it.

Neova is the other arrangement. **NeoDrive** is a drive your team already knows how to use. Under it, every file is encrypted in the browser, then stored on a **private IPFS network** that only authorized nodes can join. Folders stay fast, because the tree lives in an index. The network does the job it is built for: keep the bytes, and hand them back to the right person.

This documentation is that product, that network, and the open protocol work behind both. The Private Indexer and the Swarm Accelerator run on Neova today. They are also public specifications, discussed with the IPFS community and backed by an **IPFS Foundation** grant, so other private swarms can use the same ideas.

### What you get

**A drive.** Folders, drag-and-drop upload, download, trash, favorites, quotas. Sign in with email or SSO. A wallet is optional, and it stays in the profile.

**Encryption before anything is stored.** The browser encrypts the file. Nodes, the indexer, and the read gateway store and move ciphertext.

**A closed swarm.** A swarm key keeps the network separate from public IPFS. Content is found through the Private Indexer, in one request, with nodes already ranked by health.

**Reads that do not wait on a slow peer.** The Swarm Accelerator asks the best nodes, opens a second path if the first stalls, and keeps recent files warm in cache.

**A network people can join.** Operators who keep capacity online earn points from the time the indexer actually sees them available.

### Who it is for

**Teams.** NeoDrive is the everyday product. IPFS stays behind the interface. Beta testers use it the way they use any drive: upload, find the file, download it.

**Operators.** You bring disk and uptime to the swarm. The dashboard follows real availability, measured from the private network, and turns that time into points.

**Companies that want the stack, not only the screen.** The same swarm, indexer, accelerator, and encryption can carry backup, partner capacity, and other applications that read and write by content address.

### Two decisions that make it work

IPFS addresses a file by its fingerprint. It does that extremely well. A drive also has to list a folder, sort by date, count a quota, and rename a file without rewriting it. Those are different jobs.

Neova splits them.

1. **The product.** An index holds names, folders, permissions, and quotas. IPFS holds encrypted bytes. Renaming a one-gigabyte file updates the index. The content stays where it is. See Distributed infrastructure.
2. **The network.** A private swarm cannot use the public directory. The Private Indexer is the directory we specified and deployed. The Swarm Accelerator uses that directory to read quickly. Swarm Keys v2 is the control plane that adds identity, roles, and revocation on top of the shared key.

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