– DRAFT –
Social Web Incubator CG

Intros

Doing reintroductions/hello

<Grishka> okay, it's service workers AGAIN

Intros: bengo, Dmitri, Sebastian so far

<Grishka> imagine making a website in 2021 without a service worker

Demos

<dmitriz> @Grishka - come to https://meet.jit.si/SocialCG

Grishka introducing https://github.com/grishka/Smithereen

<Loqi> [grishka] Smithereen: Federated, ActivityPub-compatible social network server with friends, walls, and groups.

<Grishka> I'd show some screenshots but IRC doesn't support that

<dmitriz> @Grishka - you could share screen tho

bengo: Beginning project updates (5m) with Sebastian: redaktor

Sebastian is sharing screen for demo. Cool!

sl007: (overview of Redacktor)
… written in TypeScript, headless CMS
… uses widgets / WebComponents

<bengo1> https://github.com/redaktor/widgets-preview/

<bengo1> 2min remaining

sl007: I've done a PoC / pilot, where I showcased different widgets / cards
… (showing screenshots)

<hellekin> https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/seeking-opinions-on-time-based-content/1566

<bengo1> Times up :)

Dmitri: Hey I'm Dmitri, codenamedmitri in socialhub

dmitri: do a lot of work in verifiable credentials, solid, DIF Confidential Storage

dmitri: I'm always the first one to recommend ActivityPub whenever it's appropriate. Want to build bridges to DIF, CCG, Fediverse

<dmitriz> https://github.com/interop-alliance/life-server

dmitri: Currently involved with two projects. First is life-server, which is a solid server written in javascript, which I'm working on adding ActivityPub integrations to

<dmitriz> https://github.com/xr3ngine/xr3ngine

<Loqi> [interop-alliance] life-server: A decentralized personal data framework inspired by MIT's Solid Project

dmitri: Other one is xr3ngine, which is VR and AR (Augmented Reality) server and client that runs in the web browser

<Loqi> [xr3ngine] xr3ngine: An end-to-end solution for hosting humans and AI in a virtual space, built on top of react, three.js and express/feathers. This repo includes a fully-feature client, API server, realtime gamerserver, game engine and devops for scalable deployment. Pick and choose what you need or deploy the whole stack and start building your application on top.

dmitri: Before I got involved int he project, I did not realize how much 3d/VR stuff is built into the web browser, and how good the WebXR APIs are

dmitri: VR community is interested in ActivityPub integration and Solid tech

dmitri: They are starting up a group that I'm encouraging to coordinate with this group here. Need to standardize things like friends list, contacts list, activitiy feeds, etc.

dmitri: First call for that group is today in 2.5 hrs

dmitri: Open meta verse intro group

<dmitriz> https://www.google.com/url?q=https://github.com/omigroup/OMI/discussions/11%23discussioncomment-625557&sa=D&source=calendar&usd=2&usg=AOvVaw26-A8uTF0OYa7nLn_0uT8r

(2m15s remaining)

<dmitriz> https://github.com/omigroup/OMI/discussions/11#discussioncomment-625557

dmitri: I want to see cross pollination there. People from this community should come join

dmitri: Come join the open meta verse interop group

Grishka is gregory?

Grishka: I don't think anyone has seen my project

Grishka: This is the news feed. Looks like Facebook. Has posts like this.

<dmitriz> https://github.com/grishka/Smithereen ^

Grishka: There are walls (on user profile pages). You can go to other peoples pages, write something. Can change language

<Loqi> [grishka] Smithereen: Federated, ActivityPub-compatible social network server with friends, walls, and groups.

(it looks like og thefacebook.com but green)

Grishka: There is. page for my friends. Can see friend requests. Can see profiles with walls.

<dmitriz> +1, Groups are super important

Grishka: The one thing that no one wants to talka bout ever in ActivityPub… Groups!

Grishka: This is a group, where people can join. Other people can manage. Or moderate.

Grishka: They are fully federated. Haven't tested that, because there is only one instance, which is this one.

<hellekin> I'd be interested in setting up a smithereen instance for testing

Grishka: This only works locally right now. So you can't promote remote users to administrators.

<dmitriz> @Grishka -- good design!

<Loqi> @Grishka has -1 karma over the last year

Grishka: This is a feature I built the other day: Blocklists

<hellekin> maybe we can do that on Thursday during the workshop Grishka?

Grishka: Groups also have walls. (Demos it)

Grishka: Next features I'm working on is: being able to send email notifications/confirmations, password resets

Grishka: Currently there is no way to reset your password. That's annoying. After that's done, I will make my first release

Grishka: Collaborators not at this point

Grishka: I've always created a Fediverse Enhancement Proposal about federated walls. That's something I want other projects to support if they have such features

<hellekin> https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/fep-400e-publicly-appendable-activitypub-collections/1438

Inspired by VK

<dmitriz> VKontakte

<dmitriz> (which just translates to "In Contact")

ianconsolata: demoing

<Grishka> hellekin you'll be able to do that after I make my first release ;)

ianconsolata: Project I'm working on is https://understory.coop

ianconsolata: One thing I want to show off and talk about and could use eyes/help on is...

ianconsolata: I used to work at circleci. We wanna know: How can we use solid as a personal data storage layer to configure things people want to deploy on a regular basis

ianconsolata: new verbal build based on these configuration files

ianconsolata: understory.garden is a personal content management system. Write notes. Configure content in our system

ianconsolata: what you do to deploy that is to write this simple turtle file that talks about what you want to deploy. Takes a template.

ianconsolata: We're trying to lean into how can we get users to deploy their own social applications

ianconsolata: promotes all these unique takes on social networks

ianconsolata: we want them to all be interoperable.

ianconsolata: reach out to understory.coop

ianconsolata: we're interested in doing a Solid + Federated ActivityPub server
… we need some type of Webhook / update functionality (like WebSub)

<bengo1> (I had forgotten to start timer FWIW)

<bengo1> https://www.w3.org/TR/websub/

ianconsolata: if anyone has suggestions, I'm new to the standards process and to W3C, but my background is from industry, so I have a lot of things to contribute

<bengo1> Nee https://pubsubhubbub.appspot.com/

ianconsolata: I'm really excited about these standards from a technical perspective, and I want to see wider adoption

<Grishka> one thing I forgot to say about Smithereen — the aim here is to recreate that cozy experience of just you and your friends and nothing in between you all, like in the good old days of VK before it was acquired and ruined

Social CG processes

bengo1: next up, let's talk about process
… I added something to the GH issue tracker a week ago,
… with the resolution / proposal that - that is should be the Issue Tracker for this CG
… hellekin commented recently, proposing that we should use a Federated issue tracker, when that's ready

bengo1: I want to incentivize people to move issues forward, async (outside of this call)
… and there's always room for process improvement

<bengo1> https://github.com/swicg/general/issues/27

<Loqi> [gobengo] #27 RESOLUTION: This is currently the primary issue tracker for SWICG

<Grishka> lol'd at hellekin's github profile pic

<bengo1> dmitri: no big objection.

<bengo1> Dmitriz: How is SWICG diff than SocialCG

<bengo1> bengo: I think they'r enot

<bengo1> https://github.com/w3c/activitypub/issues

<bengo1> hellikin: We had previous resolved to use that

hellekin: we were thinking of using the w3c ActivityPub repo for this
… we didn't want to use the larger CG with AP stuff
… so I propose that, for AP-specific issues, we use the AP repo. And for more general issues, we use the one Ben proposed?

<Grishka> there's also a third one where FEPs live

bengo1: my main goal is to consolidate the various places (forum threads, etc), and make it clearer on where issues should be brought up

<bengo1> https://github.com/w3c/activitystreams

<Loqi> [w3c] activitystreams: Activity Streams 2.0

dmitriz: All good points. Sounds like we should revisit this topic on the next call

dmitriz: We want to resume regular calls again.

dmitriz: summary: We have two specific specs with their own issue trackers (activitypub + activity streams) not to mention websub

dmitriz: for more general social web issues, we should figure out where the issues go.

dmitriz: We should figure out where the FEPs live too

dmitriz: Main deliverable by next call is a page that outlines this process.

dmitriz: e.g. activity pub issues go here, FEPs live here

dmitriz: i.e. a documentation page

dmitriz: Brings up the question which is: What is the entryway to this group?

sl007: so, ActivityPubRocks is currently the main entryway
… some community members did a lot of work on rebooting it (like CWebber), but that hasn't been published yet
… and it would be nice if we could resurrect it
… the idea was to make it an entrypoint for users, developers, also a link to the forum,
… Also, if anybody wants to take over FediverseSpace, the source code is open, and we can link to it as well

hellekin: I think sl007 makes good points,
… we need a way to get collective ownership of the site, so that no one person is a bottleneck
… there's already a topic on that, on SocialHub
… and we can open a topic on the specific issue tracker, once we settle on one

<hellekin> https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/how-to-hack-on-activitypub-rocks/375

bengo1: sounds like dmitriz has proposed that - we summarize the state of the issue trackers. (at least list them)
… anybody want to volunteer to do that? Or I can

<hellekin> https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/t/how-to-hack-on-activitypub-rocks/375

Action: bengo to draft issue tracker overview

@bengo1 - I'm happy to collaborate with you on that

bengo1: also, I have an ActivityPub.com domain, which I'd love to use
… to manage collectively
… and I'd love to set up an Infrastructure As Code repo that automates some of it, so that people can make PRs etc
… similar to w3id.org
… I'll draft a proposal for that over time.
… but lets start with this first proposal, of just listing / sorting out the issue trackers

bengo1: next up - anybody have suggestions for next topics, general discussion points?

Call for Topics for next call

ianconsolata: i'd be happy to help set up that community infrastructure repo when the time comes / that proposal passes, Ben

<Grishka> I don't think that queue bot works without you setting it up first

<bengo1> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrastructure_as_code

<bengo1> It's an imaginary Q

hehe yep. /we're/ the Q bot at the moment

<hellekin> https://socialhub.activitypub.rocks/c/community/drafts/41

bengo1: how does one use that?

bengo1: I've heard the beginnings of a topic from Grishka, about some of the related standards, like Capability Negotiation, Groups, etc

+1, Grishka, config discovery / negotiation is hugely important

Grishka: yeah, we have 1000s of ActivityPub installations with disparate feature sets

sl007: helleken, ah, we're talking about /negotiation/ part of capabilities, not like Object Capabilities specifically

Grishka: right, basically, discovering what feature sets each server supports

sl007: let's start with the Conformance section in the spec.

sl007: if I read it correctly, we don't really have any major Conformant software on the market except Pleroma

sl007: because that section says you need to implement the ENTIRE protocol for conformance
… which is not realistic
… (mentions multi-language support problems with Mastodon)
… so yeah, we need machine-readable ways of feature conformance discovery

oooh right, we're at the top of the hour

<bengo1> (People can stay after though, but we can relieve scribe etc)

<bengo1> Sebastian proposing an agenda item for capability authorization work for next time