Indeed, let me try to explain better what this is about...
A web browser is also called a User Agent because we rely on it to
access documents and code from remote, untrusted sources. It's great
that you can trust your browser that nothing bad will happen when you
load a page that includes a random <script src=...> element. However,
your browser doesn't give you much control on the data that you produce
online. One could even argue that it facilitated the emergence of
massive silos of data that make little case of user control.
So, I believe that beyond the browser, regaining control of our online
activity calls for a new kind of User Agent. It will need to provide
guarantees that your data and the code processing it are loosely coupled
and under your control. It will also need to be designed so that we can
access our data from anywhere, and allow 3rd party to write apps just
like any other website (no store, no gatekeeper of any kind).
Some use cases:
- I want to store the data from my activity tracker, either on my local
network or on a remote server I control. However, I'm fine with using
3rd party apps to get visualization & analysis of my data. That means
pulling their code to run it on my data, instead of pushing my data to
them. Also, that means getting the code to run in a sandbox that doesn't
leak back to the 3rd party.
- Once in a while, I create photo collages to print them. I'd like to
use a service that does just that, but will not get access to the raw
data of my pictures. Knowing which camera I use, the exact date,
location etc. which is in the exif data is none of their business.
- If I had a "smart" thermostat, I would like all the historical data to
be stored in my database. And I want to be able to run algorithms on
that data from different providers, to select the best one for instance.
The FoxBox is the piece that would sit in your home network, gathering
data from sensors and sending them commands, along with managing the
storage part. It may also be able to display content on an attached
device, stream sound to a remote speaker, etc.
We'll build a way to access your data from 3rd party sites, both from
the local network or outside of it. We'll let "background" processes
process the data.
There are still many pieces to fully figure out, and many choices to
make. Comments and suggestions are welcome!
Fabrice
On 12/15/2015 09:59 AM, David Flanagan wrote:
> Fabrice,
>
> I'm intrigued by the concept of a "user agent for your data" and I love
> the name "FoxBox". But I didn't get to see your lightning talk, and I
> don't think I really understand what you are proposing. The slides are
> quite high-level and the etherpad is mostly implementation detail. I'm
> guessing that I'm not the only one who doesn't get it. Could you dive
> deeper into some of the use cases or user stories that you're thinking
> about for this? If I had a FoxBox in my house, what would I use it for,
> and how would I interact with it?
>
> David
>
> On Sat, Dec 12, 2015 at 3:15 PM, Fabrice Desré <[email protected]
> <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> During the lightning talks session in Mozlando I presented an idea
> around the concept of "User Agent for your Data". The slides are
> available at https://people.mozilla.org/~fdesre/data_user_agent.pdf
>
> I wrote down some details on how we could implement this platform in an
> etherpad: https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/data-user-agent
>
> It's still very early, nothing is carved in stone, but I'd really
> appreciate if people interested by this effort could contribute to this
> document.
>
> thanks!
>
> --
> Fabrice Desré
> b2g team
> Mozilla Corporation
> _______________________________________________
> dev-fxos mailing list
> [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
> https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-fxos
>
>
--
Fabrice Desré
b2g team
Mozilla Corporation
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