XSF Discussion - 2021-01-21

As you may noticed: riseup.net is going to discontinue their xmpp service. They would have discontinued it even already if it wasn't for the reason Tails is using it for their MUC's. If you are unaware of the reasons to shut it down, those bits from an interview with riseup dating back to 2020/06 might be of interest to you: "However, for basic service, we have some details in the database of users, and probably their ‘buddy lists’. This service is not very well used, and we are considering discontinuing it because we’d rather not have any of this data." Prior to that, they where explaining how the FBI requested data from them. Shutting down everything that holds to much meta data protects riseup and so their users. You can read the full interview here: https://pramen.io/en/2020/06/interview-with-riseup-tech-collective/ Tails needs now a new home for their chat rooms. If it will be xmpp is undecided. The issue related to that can be found here: https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/tails/tails/-/issues/17956 If you believe you have helpful/usefull input on that matter, feel free comment in that issue or/and join xmpp:tails-dev.conference.riseup.net ✏

seems sensible from their POV. Now I wonder how others, like Matrix, protect the user data: Is it not on the server? Encrypted on the server?

and a follow up question: does an xmpp server need access to the roster if no session of the user is connected?

flow: limited roster access is needed

You need rosters for access control, like PEP

I suppose you could get away with just not responding to presence probes if they're offline.

flow: I'm sure that a server implementation can be written that will store all user data encrypted asymmetrically, with a password that the client provides on login to unlock the private key, and one-way-hashes of JIDs for ACLs

but that probably requires rewriting from scratch

Ge0rG, sure or confident that this is possible? ;)

I'm pretty sure you can. I did a proof-of-concept once doing precisely what Ge0rG describes

ok, but that means at least that third parties are able to check if a JID is in the roster, right?

and hence, brute force

(with a list of known JIDs)

Zash: a subset of what I described. And it wasn't ever tested.

flow: yes

flow: third parties that have read access to your storage

Ge0rG, oh, sorry, didn't read until the end of that 🙂

But it derived a key from login data and used that for a subset of user data.

I'd love to migrate yax.im to this kind of storage, but it needs to be using efficient encryption and storage mechanisms, not RSA in base64 in lua serialized tables

Not rosters tho

Again the question: Do I need to ask for any permissions on blog posting? Is there another native offering to review (Sam recommended)?

Personally I'd just get someone who's a native speaker who you trust not to change your words to do an editing pass before merging. Ie. just let them change it freely and hit merge without going back and forth.

As long as it's only editorial and doesn't change what you're saying it would probably make things quicker.

Fine for me, but if one is doing so, please announce to not have cross editing

emus (sorry, no idea how to PM on my laptop and I got tired of using my phone): I'm not sure who has permission to merge a blog post and is a native speaker, sorry. I assume someone from the comm team would be best, but I don't know who's on that

Although XSF policy appears to be "board has to approve everything and there's little point to delegating authority to committees" as far as I can tell, so maybe a board person?

(although I also can't remember why I formed that opinion, something recently where a committee wasn't allowed to tweet or something; no idea if it also applies to the website)

Commteam?

Dunno, havent got any respone

Yeah, commteam

I thought emus was (most/part) of the commteam

Yes I am^^

oh, that's not very helpful then as far as getting more eyes on it and having a native speaker do an editing pass before hiting merge :)

I ask, about approval, but no one replied

I mean, I can keep pointing out grammar that doesn't sound quite right, it will just be a lot of round trips.

I can write an email to board if you prefer, but I thought discussion here is better

Maybe thing to do is to just publish it, then it's guaranteed to be reviewed by someone who will find every typo! 🙂

emus: yeah, just commit it already!

🤯️

I feel like it doesn't look great if we publish a blog post with a lot of bad grammar (not that I blame emus of course, not being a native speaker, just that the official XSF language is English so it doesn't seem great to go straight to the web without review)

If Sam says there is a lot weird stuff, I prefer to get it right - at least give it another roung

d

SamWhited: didn't you do a review of the grammar already?

on the other hand if no one can review it in 3 days just go, better than nothing, most of it looks fine to me except the one thing I pointed out

Ge0rG: I did a quick pass, but I wasn't sure what some of it meant at all so I couldn't make suggestions and what not.

not *perfect* but *fine*

moparisthebest: I fully agree

Give me 30 seconds to go through it again if you don't mind, if I see anything really weird I'll point it out, otherwise I don't have any authority here anyways :)

take 30 minutes if you like

The only real thing I'd say needs to change still is the title, it doesn't really make sense to me and sounds a bit odd (though I don't know if it's technically incorrect grammar)

I'm struggling to think of something that says what you're trying to say though

Take your time if you can

I want to say in a more clear way: The decision about you communication is a decision about the technology, not about the chat app/ instant messenger you use

That makes sense, I'm not sure how to condense that into a snappy title that sounds correct though. I'll think about it.

"Messaging is not about the app" maybe

Oh yah, that sounds a lot better

"Instant Messaging: it's not about the app"

Sounds fine to me

Instant Messaging is not about the choice of the app

?

I would like to have it as a sentence

Instant Messaging is not about which app to choose

That one sounds odd again; it's not wrong, the phrasing just makes it longer than it needs to be and it has more articles than are necessary

All three of Ge0rG's sound pretty good

I'm gonna send the final version to board/council, so at least I informed them

All of Ge0rG's are valid sentences too, so I wouldn't be concerned about that. Titles don't really need to be sentences anyways.

The second one is IMHO the most catchy one and might intrigue to read what it is about

Instant Messaging is not about which app to choose

yes

That one works

Okay, I go with Georg second

Brevity is king

+1 ⤴️

can I write it like this?

Instant Messaging: It is not about the app

"it's" sounds better to me (but it doesn't matter)

or Should it really be It's

ok

just nit picking now

yeah thats good

I would like to pin it to twitter

other one is 5 yrs old

Left a few more comments, nothing major.

(still good)

"I could have stood up" still sounds weird to me too, but I have no idea how to fix it or if it's even technically wrong, so whatever.

ok, let me go through it

Sam, the second sub title: It's not about the app but about the technology (works?)

Isn't it about interoperable technology?

lets keep it simple here I think

emus: yah, that sounds fine to me

Ge0rG but I will name it in the list

By "very evaluated" did you mean "educated"?

It reads better to me if you drop the "very" and just make it "educated", but I'm not sure if that's what you meant

I acutall meant evaluation

like "reviewing"

I don't think that's how that' snormally used

Okay, let me think about it, in the meanwhile: can you confirm zashs comments? https://github.com/xsf/xmpp.org/pull/871

https://github.com/xsf/xmpp.org/pull/871#discussion_r562152494

I think I already replied to them :)

ok cool

--> well-founded ?

"because they made a well-founded choice." sounds good to me. That means the same thing as an educated choice.

Ah okay, educated sounded like school to me 😀

but I guess thats just my German mind^^

On the other hand, I also see they usually do not switch platforms because they made a very well-founded choice for one specific messenger, which is also not easy.

I'd drop the "very" personally, it's not necessary.

ok

gone

Sam, are you at least "okay" with it now? :D

I still don't understand that sentence even without the "very". I know what you're trying to say because we've been talking about it, but I don't think I get it from that sentence.

The "which is also not easy" doesn't follow from what you said before, for example. I'm not sure what you mean by that part.

What's not easy?

Making a well-founded choice?

On the other hand, I usually do not see they made a well-founded choice (which is also not easy) for one specific messenger.

I dunno, I wouldn't listen to me though. I can keep nit picking, but I'm not a great editor so if we don't actually have anyone who approves these things or is a good editor it's probably fine to just merge. I appreciate you valuing my opinion, but it's probably not worth listening to me :)

Does the simpler version work? ^

Sam you are really helping, yes its taking time, but I think that was worth it. Is alright!

Actually, I'm not even sure how this is an "on the one hand, on the other" situation. Aren't these two things the same thing? They're just making a quick decision and it's not very well thought out sound like the same thing to me

is board@xmpp.org correct?

oooh, wait, maybe I'm misunderstanding entirely. Are you saying that even when people make an educated choice they still switch frequently?

nope 🙂

wait

Many people just make a short-term decision about their communication software and this usually is not a well-founded choice for one specific messenger. So, the people just switch again and again.

ahh, yah, that makes a lot of sense to me

Only little nit pick on that is "Many people make short-term decisions about their…"

Maybe s/Many/Often?

Or spontaneous?

"Often, people make short-term decisions about their" sounds good to me too, either way.

yes

I'd also maybe consider "So the people switch again and again, or add yet another messenger to their collection"

Or "Many people switch again and again or add yet another messenger to their list" or something like that

But that doesn't matter as much, I'm just trying ot avoid the "Actually," which IMO breaks up the thought and is a bit jarring.

(but it's not "wrong" per say)

Let me have the line break there (please :))

I want to continue the thought actually

I think, as long the gramma is okay, its fine

yah, I think that one's fine, I'm just nitpicking at this point.

Done?

Sure

Hi arc, dave (dwd ?), matthew (Wild?), ralphm and Seve - please approve and merge if you are satisfied: https://github.com/xsf/xmpp.org/pull/871

I don't know who even has access to do that

And thanks Sam for giving it a second try.

arc, If you all give me your "Go", I can do it myself ✏

Also a sub-question: One said that the bylawys state english as official XSF language. So if I would like to offer translations, thats a no go or it just needs to published else where, or possible to have that as follow-up posts?

I don't see "english" or "language" in https://xmpp.org/about/xsf/bylaws

Yeah - okay, with or without it basically makes sense

I suspect that difficulties publishing translations on the website may be more of a technical nature than legal (or whatyoucallit what the bylaws says)

Bunch of wording that IIRC is to explicitly allow remote communication for meetings and such is the closes I can find.

Maybe there's something about language inherited from the General Corporation Law of the State of Delaware, but I'm not going to venture into that.

okay, you mean it has a different meaning in another language?

Huh?

I'm afraid I don't follow.

Me, too 😀 What were your three statements about, I think I didnt understand correctly

1. I'm not sure if publishing translations is easy with Pelican. 2a. Our bylaws says nothing about an official language. 2b. I don't know if any other law that may apply says anything about language.

Ah okay, I just thought publishing new blog post with clear reference as translation of the english article ✏

2b, lets wait for the board

There is no problem with the XSF publishing translations of its blog posts

The bylaws are about how the organization is run, not about what gets posted on the blog

ok, thx

> Instant Messaging is not about which app to choose I like it. Here's another option: Communication is not about which app to choose. And then starting to explain what's important for/while having a conversation and how that aplies to xmpp.