Hello all. I'm interested in working on the easy migration of account idea for the Google Summer of Code [1]. I've already submitted my proposal for it, but I also wanted to post a message here and start hashing out ideas and get the opinions of others. I haven't developed for StatusNet before, so if I get anything fundamentally wrong or I seem to be confused about something, let me know. This is all a learning experience for me! :)
I really like the idea of being able to download my account data, either for the purpose of just having a backup copy or for use in migrating to a new account. The way I see it, this should include posts, subscriptions, and groups at the very least. One complication I see with downloading or transferring posts is something has to be done about any file attachments. Brion suggested to me that maybe that could be handled by dynamically generating a Zip file. I've noticed that some of the building blocks are already there, like the FOAF links for downloading your subscriptions and subscribers. And since OStatus already uses Activity Streams to transmit new notices, I think that could be used to also transfer all of your notices between accounts. The same goes for groups too. I'm also wondering if it would be a good idea to allow users to import their data into a new account from backup files, in addition to directly transferring it. The big issue I see with this is security. That data is publicly available, so it would be easy for someone to take your notices and import them into their account. I know Atom feeds can be signed, so I'm wondering if that could be used to verify the data so only its owner can import it. And in the case of transferring it between accounts, maybe the same security could be used. Please let me know your thoughts and opinions on this, especially the security aspects. I'm trying to learn all I can about OStatus and Atom right now so I can figure this out. [1] http://status.net/wiki/Google_Summer_of_Code_2010#Easy_migration_of_account
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