looking at https://github.com/sockethub/sockethub/blob/master/lib/protocols/sockethub/platforms/facebook.js#L45 it seems there can be only one session, and if a second session would come in, while a first request is pending, it would squat the same module instance and overwrite that variable?

or does it instantiate multiple instances of module.export?

they should both give roughly the functionality of http://social.michiel.5apps.com/ but need to update both to the new set verb. shouldn't be too much work i think

See conversation in issue #60 for the initial discussion.

i accidentally committed it to upstream/master instead of into a pull request as i wanted to, but fwiw, this is what i would propose:

54f3b0e

to reproduce, check out #19 and try to tweet post something to twitter. you will see the error on nodejs stdout.

it could at least say "please reconnect for these changes to take effect" in the log

it is not clear to me how a platform can reply to the dispatcher,and i need that for https://github.com/unhosted/website/tree/master/adventures/6 . i'll try to implement a proposal for that today, where the platform function returns a promise that acts like a standard nodejs-style function(err, data) callback.

hi,

i will not send a pull request yet because i don't have any unit tests for it, but just as a heads-up, for my email app, i an now using this:
michielbdejong/sockethub@smtp...master

https://github.com/mscdex/node-imap

it keeps saying

[DEBUG - 2013-05-11T14:45:19.016Z]  [listener:xmpp] waiting for cleanup to finish...
[DEBUG - 2013-05-11T14:45:20.019Z]  [listener:xmpp] waiting for cleanup to finish...
[DEBUG - 2013-05-11T14:45:21.019Z]  [listener:xmpp] waiting for cleanup to finish...

and hangs. then when i Ctrl-c it, it does:

[DEBUG - 2013-05-11T14:45:24.023Z]  [listener:xmpp] waiting for cleanup to finish...
[WARN  - 2013-05-11T14:45:24.359Z]  [dispatcher] platform xmpp hasnt responded to ping
[ERROR - 2013-05-11T14:45:24.359Z]  [dispatcher] listeners failed to respond to ping, aborting.

Wondering if you have any feedback on this @michielbdejong or @nilclass

I'd like to implement 'follow', however I'm caught in a bit of a paradox about how it should be used.

• On one hand, it has been suggested it's used to indicate subscribing to something: follow RSS feed, follow a Twitter user
• On the other hand, it's also indicative of receiving the actual updates themself: follow your email account to get new messages.

How are these technically the same things? If we issue a follow command to an RSS feed, does this mean there has to be constant polling of the RSS feed to send new posts to the user right away? What about when the user signs out of sockethub? Are we then 'unfollowing' the RSS feed? This doesn't make a huge amount of sense as you should only follow the RSS feed once, right? Then you need a new verb to describe retrieving the messages.

Perhaps there's a need for a poll command which is different than the follow command? Polling your RSS feeds would give you all updates. But then what does subscribing (following) offer? And how does this behave across sessions?

For email, does it make sense, then, to 'follow' your email? Or do you just poll?

For twitter or facebook. Again, whats the point of 'follow' when, in the end, you'll need to poll for updates to your feed. And how do those follow's persist across sessions?

If you've given this any thought I'd be curious to know what your take on this is. I have trouble correllating these activity streams paradigms to actual implementations sometimes.

When I implement a platform, I may need to keep some kind of state between messages (such as persistent connections in some cases - e.g. xmpp).
All this needs to be cleaned up once the websocket connection is closed.

So to make this work I propose that platforms can expose an optional "cleanup" function, which is called once a connection is closed.

Example:

var stuff = {};

exports.cleanup = function(sessionId) {
  if(stuff[sessionId]) {
    // do some cleaning up if needed, then
    delete stuff[sessionId];
  }
}

i don't see mailing list so put it here for now :)

http://pump.io
(by Evan Prodromou who previously worked on StatusNet)

"What's it for?

I post something and my followers see it. That's the rough idea behind the pump.

There's an API defined in the API.md file. It uses activitystrea.ms JSON as the main data and command format.

You can post almost anything that can be represented with activity streams -- short or long text, bookmarks, images, video, audio, events, geo checkins. You can follow friends, create lists of people, and so on.

The software is useful for at least these scenarios:

Mobile-first social networking
Activity stream functionality for an existing app
Experimenting with social software

"

/root/run/sockethub/lib/protocols/sockethub/dispatcher.js:373
var report = jsv.validate(o, proto.verbs[verb].schema);
^
TypeError: Cannot read property 'schema' of undefined
at WebSocketConnection.Dispatcher.connect.connection.sendUTF.JSON.stringify.rid (/root/run/sockethub/lib/protocols/sockethub/dispatcher.js:373:57)
at WebSocketConnection.EventEmitter.emit (events.js:93:17)
at WebSocketConnection.processFrame (/root/run/sockethub/node_modules/websocket/lib/WebSocketConnection.js:403:26)
at WebSocketConnection.handleSocketData (/root/run/sockethub/node_modules/websocket/lib/WebSocketConnection.js:247:14)
at Socket.EventEmitter.emit (events.js:93:17)
at TCP.onread (net.js:396:14)

it should catch this and reply 'command unrecognized', 'platform unrecognized', 'unparseable', etcetera. nothing you throw at it should cause it to topple.

i am trying to use sockethub to execute shell commands as per https://unhosted.org/adventures/6/Controlling-your-server-over-a-WebSocket.html . can you add a minimal example to html/index.html that shows how to execute 'whoami' or 'ls' or whatever when the user clicks a button? I have this working in https://github.com/michielbdejong/sockethub, but i used a secret in each command instead of in register, and i would like to switch to your way of doing it, but i can't fully see how it works from the current code.

Cheers!
Michiel.

Hi Nick (and others),

Maybe if you have time for this at the airport tomorrow, you could proof-read my blogpost about Sockethub https://unhosted.org/adventures/6/Controlling-your-server-over-a-WebSocket.html - if not don't worry i'll just publish it as it is. have a safe flight!

Ciao,
Michiel

i'm gonna go with https://github.com/ditesh/node-poplib for POP3. i can't think of a good ActivityStreams verb, so i'll just go with 'retrieve' for now. i think all platforms can deliver activities they retrieve to the 'inbox' module on remoteStorage, if the sockethub server has access to that.

we can switch this sort of things around as we see how it looks, obviously, but i want to have something working for my blogpost tomorrow.

it would be nice to have some '[email protected]' config prefilled on the xmpp tab of html/index.html. i will see if i can reverse-engineer the code to come up with this

Most of the code is nested deeply in lib/protocols/sockethub/(platforms/). I would suggest to instead have something like:

lib/dispatcher.js
lib/listener.js
lib/session.js
lib/server/http.js // was lib/httpServer
lib/server/ws.js
lib/schema/protocol.js
lib/schema/verbs.js
lib/platforms/...

Then possibly protocol.js could be renamed platforms.js, because it primarily aggregates information about platforms from lib/platforms/ (also most of the info in there could be gathered automatically, by loading the platforms and examining their exports).

What do you think?

i ran into this because i'm in a hotel that blocks outgoing port 25, so sockethub times out when trying to send an email.

they don't block port 465 though, meaning that sending over tls should be possible. but afaik there is no way to specify that in the actor credentials?

I tried to do this last week, but it turned out to be trickier than I anticipated, and so I gave up for the time being. Should re-visit it at some point.

when sending an email.

workaround: click 'set config' before sending an email.

there's already tests in place which ensure there is a cleanup function, but it should be extended for both cleanup and init and test for promises.

i'm continuously restarting sockethub with code changes, and then my all needs to connect (on the websocket level) and register again, obviously. not sure why, but this is taking a very long time. how is this for you?

right now i'm doing something like

https://github.com/sockethub/sockethub/pull/39/files

when posting to https://www.facebook.com/unhostedwebapps

otherwise you can only post on your own wall, which for the way people use facebook in practice is really not enough imho.

as you can see in the closed pull request, i don't have working code for this with tests and schemas, sorry.

send private messages on facebook.

should be able to send file attachments in email.

i know the syntax for this is still up in the air, but i went ahead and created a 'fetch' verb that allows you to retrieve the list of facebook friends of the current user:
michielbdejong@919d2fd

i need this for this week's Unhosted Adventures episode, which will be about contacts.

implement send command for twitter

some performance tips from @nilclass in issue #60
#60 (comment)

when i set the credentials config in the facebook tab of html/index.html, a 'facebook account' appears. i would expect the same thing on the email tab, but it somehow doesn't, i keep having a dropdown with zero accounts in it on the email tab

sockethub should do a better job of letting the client know that a command failed because the platform was not initialized, rather than silently dropping the job like it does now (added to a queue that is never read from).

the xmpp data struct is a bit complex, will need to spend some time figuring out how to handle all the various types of messages you can receive: how to identify them, and extract the necessary data.
using node-xmpp lib https://github.com/astro/node-xmpp/

i would like to link from https://unhosted.org/ to http://sockethub.org/ and also use that URL instead of http://github.com/sockethub/sockethub when mentioning the project. Could you maybe put at least the logo and a link to the repo on there? also, i mentioned your project in last week's Adventures episode, but i guess it would be useful to start a thread about it on https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/unhosted maybe? Just an idea :)

Cheers!
Michiel.

it would be nice if i could distribute a platform, like the webrtc.js i'm working on right now, and distribute it on its own as a sort of plugin/module for sockethub. just drop the file into lib/protocols/sockethub/platforms/, and maybe activate it in config.js, and it could work without further code changes.

now i have to go through the 'burocracy' as i call it, editing protocol.js to manually add the platform and the verbs it support.

i understand you need this when introducing new verbs, because of the schemas and everything, but if a platform only implements existing verbs, then it would be nice if you could just drop it in without editing the core code.

i thought that was also the plan originally, that it would work that way?

if an error was sent once, then nothing will work anymore until you close the WebSocket and reconnect it.

i think errorSent should be reset to false at the start of on('message')?

happens when sending an email.

yeah, quite cryptic :)

cc @nilclass @michielbdejong

Currently there's not defined way of passing credentials to a platform, and keeping them active for the session. Niklas has a working XMPP proof of concept, and in this initial implementation it seems he just passes the credentials along with 'message' verb. (BTW - if this is what we decide to use it should be specified in the schema, and examples).

The bonus to this, is that we can easily use different accounts without needing to establish some sort of 'sub-session' within a sockethub session, and the platform does not need to maintain state of any kind. It just handles each request from the beginning to end.

The downside, is also that there's no real state for the platform. So you wouldn't be able to do any polling for updates to send to the client (unless the platform kept active using the credentials from a 'message' command, but this kind of implicit behavior can be misleading).

We could have some sort of 'init' verb, which establishes the identity of the 'actor'. The identity could be encapsulated in the username, and stored in a platform specific internal object. This way, sending new messages, you would still specify the 'actor' and based on that address, the platform could look up existing credential details or a previously received token, and use that to post messages. The user could switch between different accounts, simply by specifying the different 'actor', as long as that actor was previously 'init'ialized.

Is init a good name for it? authenticate? authorize? register (might be a bad idea to use this with a different meaning that the initial sockethub register).

What do you guys think? Feedback much appreciated.

we need a logo!

Once you've set the credentials for your XMPP platform, you must 'checkin' to log in. If you are not logged in, but try to send a message, it will also automatically log you in, but it's better to log in first with this command:

{
  "platform": "xmpp",
  "verb": "checkin",
  "actor": {
    "address": "[email protected]",
  },
  "object": {
    "state": "online",    // online, offline, dnd, away
    "statusText": null,
  }
}

hey @nilclass any chance I could get you to write some tests for xmpp support? there's a teste tool "Mock" which would allow you to write some mock function for any xmpp stuff that requires external server/connections.

request-friend
remove-friend
make-friend (indicates the act is complete)

when trying to send an email (using the email app), i get:

node_modules/mailer/lib/node_mailer.js:59
      if(client == hostClients[options.user]) {
                   ^
ReferenceError: hostClients is not defined
    at SMTPClientPool.send (/media/mich/remotestorage/owncloud-freedombox/admin
/open_web_apps/code/projects/sockethub/node_modules/mailer
/lib/node_mailer.js:59:20)
    at SMTPClient.EventEmitter.emit (events.js:93:17)
    at SMTPClient._createConnection (/media/mich/remotestorage/owncloud-
freedombox/admin/open_web_apps/code/projects/sockethub/node_modules/mailer
/node_modules/nodemailer/lib/smtp.js:669:14)
    at Socket.EventEmitter.emit (events.js:96:17)
    at Socket._destroy.destroyed (net.js:358:10)
    at process.startup.processNextTick.process._tickCallback (node.js:244:9)

not sure what's going wrong here, is sending email working for you? also, it kills sockethub.js which shouldn't happen, it should just stay up and report back 'error while executing command' or something

getting this when trying to send an email using html/index.html

[ERROR - 2013-03-06T11:36:52.848Z] Possibly uncaught error: [ [TypeError: Cannot call method 'log' of undefined] ]

that's all we know. it happens when you try to post something on facebook. it would be nice if we could at least see the line number of errors like this, that would make them a lot easier to track down :(

i'm using sockethub to send out pgp-signed email, here is my code:

https://github.com/sockethub/sockethub/pull/40/files#L1R22

sorry that i didn't have time to do the whole pull-request thing with the tests and the schemas and the docs and everything, i have lots of other stuff piling up this week, but i wanted to at least share my code with you, you're free to use it however works best.

hopefully it will at least serve as example code for how pgp signing can work. this is the code i use in production for actual real email sending. :)

fwiw i plan to spend some time helping with actual sockethub development in May, until then i'll just be your user base and send you support tickets! :)

for email, we have an overly complicated target schema:

"target" : [
  "to": [
    {
      "address": "[email protected]",
    }
  ],
  "cc": [
    {
      "address": "[email protected]"
    }
  ],
  "bcc": []
]

In other cases, however, this doesn't make any sense. Instead let's simplify this like so:

"target" : [  
  {
    "field": "to",
    "address": "[email protected]",
  },
  {
    "field": "cc",
    "address": "[email protected]"
  }
]

Suggestions for something other than 'field' would be welcome :) @nilclass @michielbdejong

implement the verb follow, to carry out the act of following/stop-following a person on a social network.

this is the error i get in the console when clicking 'save' for the smtp credentials in html/index.html, email pane