I think the #ActivityPub client-to-server API is extremely important and underrated.
-
@steve frankly I disagree with this point. Servers should be simple. We need to move away from the paradigm of custom purpose ActivityPub servers that Mastodon pushed where the client and server are the same service.
Timelines should be orthogonal to the ActivityPub specification and, in my opinion, kept well away from it.
What's the benefit for my client application to know what your server's preferred timeline representation is?
Let's not go down the path where everything looks like a nail because we really like hammers.
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan I think you read something other than what I wrote.
. I’m describing *user-defined* timelines where the heavy lifting is done in a server. That server would be (or could be) *general purpose* and not specific to an activity domain. I definitely wasn’t suggesting a monolithic, tightly-coupled client/server architecture. I want my timeline definitions to be portable and interoperable. -
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan I think you read something other than what I wrote.
. I’m describing *user-defined* timelines where the heavy lifting is done in a server. That server would be (or could be) *general purpose* and not specific to an activity domain. I definitely wasn’t suggesting a monolithic, tightly-coupled client/server architecture. I want my timeline definitions to be portable and interoperable.@steve apologies, I take "server" in the context of ActivityPub discussion to be an "ActivityPub server", not all the other web-servers involved in the process.
And when I say "client", I mean a "consumer of ActivityPub", which as you say, many times is also a web server.
-
@steve apologies, I take "server" in the context of ActivityPub discussion to be an "ActivityPub server", not all the other web-servers involved in the process.
And when I say "client", I mean a "consumer of ActivityPub", which as you say, many times is also a web server.
> And when I say "client", I mean a "consumer of ActivityPub", which as you say, many times is also a web server.
Indeed. Another term that I see people use in different meaning, also when talking about C2S.
In one meaning the user device is referred to, that you might need to hole-punch with to have a full AP server, or which depends on a server relay.
And the other meaning as role. As in client/server roles, pure conceptual, and which might swap too.
-
> And when I say "client", I mean a "consumer of ActivityPub", which as you say, many times is also a web server.
Indeed. Another term that I see people use in different meaning, also when talking about C2S.
In one meaning the user device is referred to, that you might need to hole-punch with to have a full AP server, or which depends on a server relay.
And the other meaning as role. As in client/server roles, pure conceptual, and which might swap too.
@smallcircles @mariusor @evan C2S is described (too loosely, but…) in the ActivityPub spec. There is a client and server aspect to C2S. A C2S client is software that uses that protocol/API to interact with an ActivityPub C2S-capable server (general or domain-specific). When I refer to an ActivityPub Client, I mean software using C2S rather than consumers of ActivityPub-related data in general.
-
@smallcircles @mariusor @evan C2S is described (too loosely, but…) in the ActivityPub spec. There is a client and server aspect to C2S. A C2S client is software that uses that protocol/API to interact with an ActivityPub C2S-capable server (general or domain-specific). When I refer to an ActivityPub Client, I mean software using C2S rather than consumers of ActivityPub-related data in general.
@steve out of curiousity why do you make a difference between a consumer of AcitvityPub (assumedly you mean something that fetches ActivityPub using HTTP GET) and a C2S client?
My assumption is that if something fetches ActivityPub objects and is capable of rendering it to another representation for its users, that's a client to server client.
Client to server has two sections: consumer and producer and I think anything that fulfills any of those can be called a C2S client...
-
@steve out of curiousity why do you make a difference between a consumer of AcitvityPub (assumedly you mean something that fetches ActivityPub using HTTP GET) and a C2S client?
My assumption is that if something fetches ActivityPub objects and is capable of rendering it to another representation for its users, that's a client to server client.
Client to server has two sections: consumer and producer and I think anything that fulfills any of those can be called a C2S client...
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan C2S has client-side and server-side aspects (different, but overlapping, behavioral requirements, etc.). Both sides consume *and* produce AP data (pull and push for S2S, currently only pull for C2S). Fetching AP data (URI dereferencing) is common to both C2S and S2S.
-
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan C2S has client-side and server-side aspects (different, but overlapping, behavioral requirements, etc.). Both sides consume *and* produce AP data (pull and push for S2S, currently only pull for C2S). Fetching AP data (URI dereferencing) is common to both C2S and S2S.
@steve yes, but something dumb that only fetches a URL and converts the resulting ActivityPub into a valid other type of representation is a valid client in my opinion. That's what I mean, was that unclear?
-
@steve yes, but something dumb that only fetches a URL and converts the resulting ActivityPub into a valid other type of representation is a valid client in my opinion. That's what I mean, was that unclear?
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan I *think* it’s
clear. I agree it’s a kind of “client”, just not necessarily a C2S client. -
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan I *think* it’s
clear. I agree it’s a kind of “client”, just not necessarily a C2S client.@steve OK, but why?
I feel like I explained my position relatively clearly, I would like to understand yours, even though I feel some animosity has started to crop up.
-
@steve OK, but why?
I feel like I explained my position relatively clearly, I would like to understand yours, even though I feel some animosity has started to crop up.
@mariusor @smallcircles @evan No animosity here. However, I’m not sure how to explain it more clearly. I’m referring to C2S as described in chapter 6 of the ActivityPub specification (and the conformance profiles in Section 2.1). It sounded to me like you’re using a more general definition of “client”, which is fine, just different in significant ways (if it only dereferences and renders AP data).
-
@evan@cosocial.ca Yeah, I mostly agree with this. It's just that the buy-in is a little bit of a chicken and egg problem. You need servers to adopt it, but you need a compelling first mover. Bonfire, maybe?
The spec definitely needs love, too. I think one of the harder things is building a timeline out of inbox activities. I feel like maybe a future version of the API could specify timelines somehow, whether it's an endpoint or some kind of basic query? Maybe there's even a way to implement alternative timelines at that level?
These are all just guesses on my part, but I feel like this could be a gateway to universal custom feeds.
@deadsuperhero so, it's a two-sided market -- clients and servers. The traditional mechanism is a "ratchet" -- build up one side, then build up the other, and then build up the first.
So, yes, servers first, then clients, then more servers, more clients, and so on back and forth.
-
@smallcircles @evan An AS2 Collection cannot be a timeline (in general). It’s not even ordered. An AS2 OrderedCollection (a subtype of Collection) might be ordered by time or not, so it’s also not a timeline (in general). When they are ordered by some time value (unspecified in AP) they are often called “streams” in the spec. The Mastodon content timelines are not the same as AP activity streams although a filtered AP stream can be transformed to a content timeline.
@smallcircles To follow up on the discussion from yesterday, @evan has created a proposal for another kind of “event stream” that is not necessarily associated with *any* AP collection type (see Example 1). This is more aligned with my mental model of an event feed/stream, where a timeline^1 is the history of the feed after optional filtering and content materialization. (^1 However, the terms are often used interchangeably in the Fedi.)
-
@deadsuperhero so, here's my best bet. I can be wrong!
1. Get some servers to implement the API well.
2. Get some must-have clients that run on those servers. This shows the value of the API.
3. Our leading servers shift to supporting it.That may work; I don't know. It's my best bet right now!
I want to note that WordPress is working on the API!
Definitely interested in a universal client-server API for my own app
That was a partial hurdle to originally creating it until I decided to bite the bullet and build on the Mastodon API for now (since that's where my Social Web account lives)
Hello! It looks like you're interested in this conversation, but you don't have an account yet.
Getting fed up of having to scroll through the same posts each visit? When you register for an account, you'll always come back to exactly where you were before, and choose to be notified of new replies (either via email, or push notification). You'll also be able to save bookmarks and upvote posts to show your appreciation to other community members.
With your input, this post could be even better 💗
Register Login