XSF Discussion - 2022-01-20


  1. dwd

    Possibly silly idea - a collection of ansible/TF for spinning up all the different XMPP servers plus a web client on AWS free tier (or similar), so given some preexisting DNS name, people could run up a server instantly. Does such a thing exist already?

  2. Zash

    Snikket

  3. dwd

    Ah, good point. But I was thinking of this for all the servers. So, if people want to try out ejabberd, or Openfire, or whatever they can. And mostly, I think, as a demonstration - I keep thinking that Matrix has only the one server (well, two - there's FinChat too), whereas one of our strengths is that we have many.

  4. guus.der.kinderen

    I was contemplating something very similar, but with the objective to facilitate integration testing.

  5. Zash

    dwd: Enjoy dealing with the multitude of reverse proxies everyone apparently already have on that server.

  6. moparisthebest

    I was just planning to do the same for local testing too guus.der.kinderen ...

  7. moparisthebest

    but with the added complexity of fake dns servers etc

  8. guus.der.kinderen

    Openfire has a "demoboot" option that starts a fully provisioned service, which is very useful for this kind of thing

  9. dwd

    If you go to Matrix.org, they'll tell you to install Synapse (of course). We can't do the same, but we could link to or host "quickstarts" for all the servers. So instead of having to explain SRV records, Terraform can just do it. Might not be perfect for production, but gets people live and trying things out.

  10. dwd

    And yes, testing.

  11. guus.der.kinderen

    Wrapping that in a docker image would be almost trivial, and very useful. Which is why we already did that for CI

  12. moparisthebest

    who are you targetting though ?

  13. dwd

    Right, so add a bit of TF magic to do the hosting and DNS.

  14. moparisthebest

    if it's end-users, you certainly don't want them trying to decide which server and which client(s), you just want to say "use snikket"

  15. guus.der.kinderen

    People wanting to give it a test run

  16. Zash

    Or show them https://xmpp.org/chat

  17. guus.der.kinderen

    Want to play with the server

  18. dwd

    moparisthebest, Agreed, but for admins and people who *want* to run their own server, having a baseline for all the servers would be good.

  19. guus.der.kinderen

    I need to go now, but I'm very much in favour.

  20. Zash

    Yes dwd, Just Do It™

  21. ralphm bangs gavel

  22. ralphm

    0. Welcome

  23. dwd

    +AOB

  24. jcbrand

    Hi

  25. ralphm

    Hi dear Directors, Members and everyone else!

  26. ralphm

    ,

  27. ralphm

    MattJ? arc?

  28. dwd tries to recall the quorum rules for Board.

  29. ralphm

    >50%

  30. ralphm

    And having only 4 Directors makes that 3.

  31. ralphm

    dwd: but we do have a vacancy :D

  32. ralphm unbangs gavel

  33. ralphm

    emus: I did not see any e-mail. Where did you address it to?

  34. MattJ

    Sorry, something came up shortly before the meeting and I only just got to my laptop :/

  35. ralphm

    No worries, but curious: you don't use XMPP on your mobile phone?

  36. MattJ

    I do, but my phone spends most of its time in "flight mode" :)

  37. sebastian

    > Possibly silly idea - a collection of ansible/TF for spinning up all the different XMPP servers plus a web client on AWS free tier (or similar), so given some preexisting DNS name, people could run up a server instantly. Does such a thing exist already? dwd: i was also thinking of Spending some time on providing a cloud init Script for snikket so people can just copy paste that into somewhere, e.g. when they spin up a VPS at Hetzner. But so far haven't found the time. But my Thesis is almost scheduled so in summer I don't have that time killer and some room for such things... But most people probabl would need to register a domain, too.... So additional complexity. Don't know if there is any cloud provider that would let you script a xmpp server setup e2e... That would be fantastic, but i wonder if people really care that much 🤔

  38. junaid

    sebastian, not silly. it actually reminds me about the (now defunct) https://github.com/openspace42/aenigma project imho, registering a domain is a necessary requirement

  39. sebastian

    ah, didn't know aenigma. Said its discontiued...

  40. sebastian

    ah, didn't know aenigma. Sad its discontiued...

  41. sebastian

    snikket already simplifies a lot. If you can register a VPS, you probably can manage to spin up a docker-compose.yml and have a domian registered. But a "click here to buy a domain and have a fully scripted installation" would be cool

  42. Thilo Molitor

    > so I think that keeping 353 for call initiation only matches its semantics and is also a good means to implement group calls. That said, I'm okay with decoupling it from jingle and allowing to plug in different mechanisms. Ge0rG, larma: sure I'm fine with that

  43. MattJ

    dwd, this is basically what you describe, for Snikket: https://github.com/snikket-im/snikket-terraform-aws

  44. MattJ

    It may serve as a useful template for adapting to other servers too, perhaps

  45. MattJ

    It doesn't use ansible, mind... just a shell script

  46. pep.

    And now you have to learn terraform instead of the-xmpp-server

  47. MattJ

    Right :)

  48. jonas’

    terraform is simpler than the average non-snikket xmpp server setup though

  49. MattJ

    Maybe. Not entirely sure that's true if you're totally unfamiliar with it.

  50. jonas’

    maybe, indeed

  51. MattJ

    I guess if it's a ready made project and targeting a specific cloud provider, "just drop your API keys here and run 'terraform apply'" may be fairly simple indeed

  52. MattJ

    Especially now they hopefully stopped breaking everything with every release

  53. jonas’

    should make a terraform template for sovereign cloud stack…

  54. junaid

    sebastian, i've started a new wiki page to track some of the simplified or one-touch XMPP deployment options .. https://wiki.xmpp.org/web/XMPP_Simplified_Deployments

  55. sebastian

    junaid: snikket missing 😁

  56. sebastian

    ?

  57. junaid

    yea, i was trying to make sure i dont forgot to put the others... ofc i end up forgetting it

  58. junaid

    done.

  59. MattJ

    junaid, added a couple more and updated descriptions

  60. Sam

    I've got Terraform templates for prosody/postgres on digital ocean and possibly vultr or linode somewhere if someone wants them

  61. emus

    ralpm I have to read to history from to day but I just forwarded the email to board@xmpp.org

  62. emus

    ralphm I have to read to history from to day but I just forwarded the email to board@xmpp.org

  63. emus

    ralphm, MattJ, arc, jcbrand. would be happy if you guys could comment on my email before the next board meeting. I forwarded it to board@

  64. ralphm

    Hmm, wonder if we filter that out of it's moderated

  65. MattJ

    emus, to info@ right? I'm pretty sure I received something from you the other day

  66. emus

    I send it to your private mails first

  67. emus

    I can send it to info if you want

  68. MattJ

    If it's the same email, no need

  69. emus

    board@

  70. emus

    was it

  71. emus

    but actually you all shoulf have it in your personal inboxes