[geeklog-devel] GSoC 2010 is on

[Joe Mucchiello]

At 01:59 AM 1/29/2010, Dirk Haun wrote:
>cordiste wrote:
>
> >And we really need to implement some social networking for Geeklog
> >http://wiki.geeklog.net/index.php/SoC_socialnetworking

As I see it, there are a couple of core level projects that are 
absolutely necessary for social networking.

1. There needs to be support of per user (friends) and user created** 
(my bridge group) groups that follow all the existing permissions 
rules. This probably also requires a simplification of the 
permissions "widget".*
2. There should be some support for user to user messaging without 
email. (adoption/integration of Blaine pm plugin might suffice) 
Likewise adding comment support to user profiles might simulate some 
of the thing found in social networking sites.
3. User generated content on their profile (and all the existing 
profile issues that go with that). Perhaps having some way to have 
private topics (per user) would make this easy with the existing 
story code. Perhaps not.

The problem is that the infrastructure effects of these tasks require 
deep understanding of Geeklog and some of them aren't all that sexy.

* Instead of the existing, and complicated Unix bits, you give the 
user a dropdown Everyone | Logged In Users | My Friends Only | 
Other... | Private. Other would allow them to pick a different 
private group of theirs. For some objects there is one dropdown since 
only read permissions (who can see my true name?) are meaningful. For 
others there are two dropdowns (who can scribble on my profile?) 
There is a forum thread somewhere in which Blaine and I discuss user 
pools. A pool of users is a limitation placed on an "Admin" that says 
he has root powers but only as it affects his pool of users. At the 
time, the context was a corporate CMS in which you might have an 
Accounting Admin who can add and remove the folk working in 
accounting to the various accounting groups but he couldn't do 
anything to the HR people or the HR related groups. This is basically 
the same concept. The difference is the corporate CMS model has an 
superadmin who can move people in and out of pool whereas in the 
social network model users would just have "friend requests" and 
acceptances/rejections.

** As alluded to above, friends have the added wrinkle that they must 
be reciprocal. I can't make you my friend if you aren't mine. But a 
sublist of my friends is just a group within the group of friends and 
isn't reciprocal. So I can be Friends with people and I can assign 
some of them for my Family group or my WoW guild.

>I'd like to see someone step forward and take responsibility for this
>idea, please. I.e. be willing to mentor and follow up on it.

I haven't had time to finish the Calendar plugin. I certainly don't 
have time to help as a mentor.



----
Joe Mucchiello
Throwing Dice Games
http://www.throwingdice.com