vox-common v0.0.4
Postvox
STATUS: Draft/Proof-of-concept
A simple, open, distributed newsfeed network.
It takes inspiration from email, IRC, and Usenet on the one hand; and Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram on the other. It's real-time, and all that jazz.
FAQ
Q: What's it good for?
A: Newsfeeds (like RSS) or real-time chat (like IRC or XMPP).
Q: What makes it special?
A: It's an open protocol like email, which means anyone can run their own servers and participate in the wider network.
It's also easy to program custom "bots" to interact with the network. (See morsebot.js and elizabot.js for example, or say "@elizabot Hello!" to see it in action.)
Q: How do I connect to it?
A: Postvox is in open alpha. You can try it out if this makes sense to you:
$ npm install -g vox-client
$ vox init --nick yournickname # (Follow the instructions)
$ vox --nick yournickname
> :help
> :follow spacemaus
> @spacemaus Hi!Q: How do I make a chatroom?
A: Register a new nickname with vox init --nick nickname, then :follow nickname.
Q: How do I subscribe to an RSS feed?
A: Write a bot. See hackernewsfeed.js for example (which you can follow at @hackernewsfeed). It'd be a pretty easy to create a bot that accepts commands to subscribe to and unsubscribe from RSS feeds. (See morsebot.js for an example of a bot that responds to commands.)
Q: Why is the UI a lousy terminal client? Why isn't there a mobile app/web client/non-Node.js client? Why is the server an unscalable single node with a local database? What about encryption, private messages, blocking, spam preventions, upvotes, reshares, etc.?
A: Postvox is a side project. IF it turns out to be useful to people, then it would be tons of fun to build those things! But, as with most side projects, that's a pretty big if. PRs happily accepted :)
Q: But why another distributed open-source social network clone?
A: This project comes out of a thought experiment:
What if you traveled back in time to 1985 and told the major players on the Internet1 about modern "social networks" and "walled gardens" and their collective billions of users and dollars? What if they came back with you to the year 20152 and helped you design something similar, but built on principles from the Dawning Age of the Internet3? How would it be similar to modern social networks? How would it be different?
Postvox is a sketch of what such a system might look like. (It was also a good exercise for learning Node.js.)
1Back then, they were called "denizens". The term "netizen" hadn't been invented yet. 2See this fascinating alternate history documentary for an exploration of a similar idea. 3Principles like open protocols, freedom of information, distributed authority, and a resistance to nuclear attack.
Terminal client
See the README.
Install the client with npm install -g vox-client.
First, you need a nickname. Run vox init --nick <nickname> to register a
name. Minimum of six characters, maximum of 64: letters and numbers only for
now.
When you run vox init, it'll create an encryption key for you, and store
it in ~/.voxprofiles. Any data you publish will be signed with this key.
Second, you need a host for your data. There's only one right now, unless you
run your own server. The default host is at
http://vanilla.postvox.net.
Thirdly, run vox --nick <nickname> for interactive mode, or
vox stream --nick <nickname> for stream mode.
In interactive mode, type :help for help.
Stream mode
If you like "command lines" and "pipes", you perhaps may like Postvox in stream mode.
Pipe in JSON-encoded stanzas, one per line. It outputs JSON-encoded stanzas, one per line.
Example usage:
$ vox init --nickname mynickname # You only need to run this once.
...
$ touch /tmp/stanzas-to-send
$ tail -n0 -f /tmp/stanzas-to-send | vox stream --nickname mynickname &
$ echo '{ "text": "hello!" }' >> /tmp/stanzas-to-sendOptional Flags
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
--stream | The name of the stream to read from and post to. E.g., "nickname/stream". |
--seqStart | Start reading from this stanza sequence number. |
--seqLimit | Stop reading before this stanza sequence number. |
--type | Only output this type of stanza. One of "MESSAGE", "USER_PROFILE", "USER_STATUS", "VOTE". |
Clients and bots
It's pretty straightforward to write a Postvox bot. See pingbot.js and morsebot.js for example.
Example:
var VoxClient = require('vox-client')
var client = new VoxClient({
agentString: 'My pingbot'
})
client.connect()
.then(function() {
client.post({ text: 'hello!' })
client.createReadStream({ type: 'MESSAGE' })
.on('data', function(stanza) {
console.info('%s says %s', stanza.nick, stanza.text)
if (stanza.nick == client.nick) {
return;
}
client.post({
text: 'Pong: ' + stanza.text,
replyToStanza: stanza
})
})
})