Kodbox: Open-source cloud desktop with multi-storage fusion and web IDE

Dropbox meets Windows in your browser—then time-travels to PHP 5

TLDR: Kodbox promises a unified, self-hosted browser hub for all your cloud drives and even coding, but it runs on old PHP 5. Fans love the Windows-like convenience; critics warn about security, prefer Nextcloud, and joke it’s a cool idea with retro tech under the hood.

Kodbox just dropped a self-hosted, browser-based “cloud desktop” that looks like Windows Explorer and claims it can fuse all your drives—local, FTP, WebDAV, Alibaba/Tencent/Qiniu, MinIO, and Amazon’s S3—into one place. It even packs a web code editor. Fans on the thread gush: “Finally, drag‑and‑drop everywhere, history versions, tags, and one login for all my stuff!” The demo’s “demo/demo” login became a meme. But the community mood isn’t all celebration. The big twist: it requires PHP 5—an older version that set off alarms. One commenter joked it’s a “time traveler from 2008,” while another warned the attack surface looks like “a buffet.” Privacy hawks side-eye the multi-cloud wiring: handy, yes—but do you really want your files dancing across every provider? Meanwhile, the practical crowd shrugs: “Just use Nextcloud and call it a day.” Devs dunk on the web IDE, saying they trust VS Code + SSH over coding in a tab. The feature list sparked bingo jokes—COW (copy-on-write) dedup got a chorus of “moo” replies. Still, the pro‑Kodbox camp says it’s a one-click way to wrangle a messy digital life, while skeptics call it a shiny convenience with vintage plumbing. Check Kodbox and pick your drama.

Key Points

  • Kodbox is a self-hosted web file manager and web IDE that runs with PHP 5 on Linux, Windows, and Mac.
  • It supports multi-storage fusion including local disk, FTP, WebDAV, Alibaba Cloud OSS, Tencent Cloud COS, Qiniu, MinIO, and S3-compatible protocols.
  • Features include online preview/editing of hundreds of file formats, sharing, collaboration, and fine-grained permissions.
  • UI/UX mimics desktop environments with drag-and-drop, shortcuts, right-click menus, multiple viewing modes, and per-folder mode memory.
  • Advanced capabilities include version history, file deduplication via COW with double-hash verification, robust search, activity tracking, and online decompression for common archive formats.

Hottest takes

“PHP 5? My threat model just packed its bags” — sec_ops_sadness
“It’s Windows Explorer married to Dropbox, then wired to 12 clouds” — cloud_cowboy
“Just use Nextcloud + SSH, you don’t need a browser IDE” — minimal_monk
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