This talk presents an approach to building free network services and introduces Libravatar, a Django-based project to provide a federated and Open Source alternative to the Gravatar profile image hosting service, a centralised web service used by a large number of social sites in the cloud.

1. freeing the cloud
one (small) service at a time
François Marier
francois@catalyst.net.nz

5. open source
desktop
applications

6. SaaS

7. privacy ®

8. autonomy
control

10. 1980s

13. 100% free
operating systems

14. started replacing all
proprietary programs
one at a time

18. “
Developers of network services are encouraged to:
● Use the GNU Affero GPL, a license designed specifically for network
service software, to ensure that users of services have the ability to
examine the source or implement their own service.
● Develop freely-licensed alternatives to existing popular but non-Free
network services.
”
● Develop software that can replace centralized services and data storage
with distributed software and data deployment, giving control back to
users.
Franklin Street Statement, 14 July 2008

19. start replacing all
proprietary services
one at a time

22. libreprojects.net

23. looking for a small one...

25. 2. assign to email address
1. upload photo

28. 101

29. FMarier@GMail.com

30. fmarier@gmail.com

31. f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635

32. http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/
f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635.jpg

33. <img src=”http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/
f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635.jpg”>

34. <img src=”http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/
f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635.jpg”>

35. started to write a replacement

36. Libravatar

41. “80%” of what does
protected accounts

42. “80%” of what does
G / PG / X ratings
XMLRPC API

43. must fit into the world

44. must fit into the world
use the same API

45. must fit into the world
use the same API
be a Twitter client

46. use the same API
https://api.twitter.com/statuses
/show/123.xml
https://identi.ca/api/statuses
/show/123.xml

47. be a Twitter client

48. must fit into the world
use the same API
be a Gravatar client

49. use the same API
http://www.gravatar.com/avatar/
f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635.jpg
http://cdn.libravatar.org/avatar/
f52a1d3d8c39868fc92cf70828821635.jpg

50. be a Gravatar client

51. Now, how about making it better?

53. Federation via DNS
_avatars._tcp SRV avatars.catalyst.net.nz

54. IPv6

55. IPv6 SHA256

56. IPv6 SHA256 OpenID

57. IPv6 SHA256 OpenID
LDAP

58. IPv6 SHA256 OpenID
Account
LDAP
Export

59. IPv6 SHA256 OpenID
Account Photo
LDAP
Export Importers

60. What does it look like?

61. Live demo!

62. photos uploaded
or imported by users
Django

63. photos uploaded
or imported by users
Django
static files
on disk

64. avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties or imported by users
Apache
Django
(mod_rewrite)
static files
on disk

65. avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties or imported by users
high traffic
Apache
low traffic
Django
(mod_rewrite)
(static) (dynamic)
static files
on disk

66. avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties or imported by users
Apache
Django
(mod_rewrite)
static files
on disk

67. avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties or imported by users
Apache
Django
(mod_rewrite)
Gearman
Crop, resize
static files Queue
and optimise
on disk

68. avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties or imported by users
Apache
Django
(mod_rewrite)
Gearman
Crop, resize
static files Queue
and optimise
on disk

69. avatars sent to avatars sent to avatars sent to photos uploaded
third parties third parties third parties or imported by users
Apache Apache Apache
Django
(mod_rewrite) (mod_rewrite) (mod_rewrite)
Gearman
Crop, resize
static files static files static files Queue
and optimise
on disk on disk on disk

70. Who uses it?

73. --- a/IkiWiki/Plugin/comments.pm
+++ b/IkiWiki/Plugin/comments.pm
@@ -187,6 +188,16 @@ sub preprocess {
$commentauthor = $commentuser;
}
+
+ eval 'use Libravatar::URL';
+
+ if (! $@) {
+ my $email = IkiWiki::userinfo_get($commentuser, 'email');
+
+ if (defined $email) {
+ $commentauthoravatar = libravatar_url(email => $email);
+ }
+ }
}
else {
if (defined $params{ip}) {
--- a/templates/comment.tmpl
+++ b/templates/comment.tmpl
@@ -1,6 +1,10 @@
<TMPL_IF HTML5><article class="comment" id="<TMPL_VAR COMMENTID>">
<TMPL_ELSE><div class="comment" id="<TMPL_VAR COMMENTID>"></TMPL_IF>
+<TMPL_IF COMMENTAUTHORAVATAR><div class="comment-avatar">
+<img src="<TMPL_VAR COMMENTAUTHORAVATAR>" alt="" />
+</div></TMPL_IF>
+
<TMPL_IF HTML5><header class="comment-subject">
<TMPL_ELSE><div class="comment-subject"></TMPL_IF>
<TMPL_IF PERMALINK>

74. --- a/koha-tmpl/opac-tmpl/prog/en/modules/opac-detail.tt
+++ b/koha-tmpl/opac-tmpl/prog/en/modules/opac-detail.tt
@@ -675,6 +678,9 @@ YAHOO.util.Event.onContentReady("furtherm", function () {
[% ELSE %]
<div class="commentline">
[% IF ( ShowReviewer ) %]
+ [% IF ( review.avatarurl ) %]
+ <img class="avatar" src="[% review.avatarurl %]" height="80" width="80"/>
+ [% END %]
<h5>
Comment by
[% review.title %]
--- a/opac/opac-detail.pl
+++ b/opac/opac-detail.pl
@@ -295,6 +295,13 @@ $template->param(
ocoins => GetCOinSBiblio($biblionumber),
);
+my $libravatar_available = 0;
+eval 'use Libravatar::URL';
+if (! $@) {
+ $libravatar_available = 1;
+}
my $reviews = getreviews( $biblionumber, 1 );
my $loggedincommenter;
@@ -303,6 +310,9 @@ foreach ( @$reviews ) {
$_->{title} = $borrowerData->{'title'};
$_->{surname} = $borrowerData->{'surname'};
$_->{firstname} = $borrowerData->{'firstname'};
+ if ($libravatar_available and $borrowerData->{'email'}) {
+ $_->{avatarurl} = libravatar_url(email => $borrowerData->{'email'});
+ }
$_->{userid} = $borrowerData->{'userid'};
$_->{cardnumber} = $borrowerData->{'cardnumber'};

79. Get involved!
● write a plugin
www.libravatar.org libravatar.onlinegroups.net
launchpad.net/libravatar #libravatar on chat.freenode.net

80. Get involved!
● write a plugin
● host a mirror
www.libravatar.org libravatar.onlinegroups.net
launchpad.net/libravatar #libravatar on chat.freenode.net

81. Get involved!
● write a plugin
● host a mirror
● translate the UI
www.libravatar.org libravatar.onlinegroups.net
launchpad.net/libravatar #libravatar on chat.freenode.net

82. Get involved!
● write a plugin
● host a mirror
● translate the UI
● create an account today!
www.libravatar.org libravatar.onlinegroups.net
launchpad.net/libravatar #libravatar on chat.freenode.net

83. Questions?
ideas for Libravatar?
other easy services to replace?
fmarier fmarier
http://feeding.cloud.geek.nz

84. Photo credits
Storm clouds: http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnson7/1460568819/
Linen texture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/zooboing/4715048673/
Name tag: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevegarfield/833593377/
Cloud sign: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamescridland/4122948535/
Facebook data center: http://www.flickr.com/photos/traftery/5596941479/
First web server: http://www.flickr.com/photos/scobleizer/2251820987/
Bradley Kuhn: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File:Bkuhn-2008-08-20.jpg
Benjamin Mako Hill: http://www.flickr.com/photos/soulfish/2374876735
Mike Linksvayer: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joi/2595169497/
Luis Villa: http://tieguy.org/pics/Wedding/Honeymoon/Highlights/New-Zealand/img_2145
Henri Poole: http://www.flickr.com/photos/weblogsky/9271675/
Evan Prodromou: http://www.flickr.com/photos/christopheducamp/4469158609/
Jonathan Gray: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jwyg/4497000847/
Aaron Swartz: http://www.flickr.com/photos/creativecommons/3111021669/
Evan Prodromou presenting: http://www.flickr.com/photos/walkah/4831658754
Copyright © 2011 François Marier
Released under the terms of the Creative Commons
Attribution Share Alike 3.0 Unported Licence