[Freedombox-discuss] the cloud desktop

[Matt Joyce]

My proposal for the plug here:

http://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Proposals/AnonProposal

Is intended to deal with that.  If we focus on locking down the secure mesh
transport layer and a functional distributed object store for the boxes we
solve a hell of a lot of issues and allow for direct integration into any
existing technology.

But some of the folks in this list are hell bent on running their own mail
servers and such.  So there is going to be some fracturing in this community
right from the get go.

-Matt

On Sat, Feb 26, 2011 at 10:23 AM, Joseph Annino <joeaguy at joeaguy.com> wrote:

> I have been thinking about a lot of the same issues as Freedombox since
> last LibePlanet where RMS presented the "Who does that server really serve?"
> paper.  The reaction from the crowd seemed to be "but I really like all
> these Google, etc, cloud services, how can I keep using this kind of
> thing?".  These services I sort of think of as being a kind of "desktop in
> the cloud".  They provide a simple easy to use consistent interface that
> will work anywhere.  That is the huge appeal, but they of course have all
> the pitfalls of central control currently.  I wanted to try and make a free
> equivalent that gives people back choice and control over their data.
>
> This seems to be a little different than the discussion of Freedombox is
> see at the moment, being more focused on making a linux distro out of
> existing parts.  That is really important, but I think the next step is to
> to make a free cloud desktop, a sort of "gnome for the cloud".
>
> I have been working on something like this for a while, which I have called
> "Pick Our Your Cloud".  You can link to its gitorious repository from
> yrcloud.com.  I've made it all AGPLv3.
>
> I haven't shared this project with many people, all the work on it so far
> is just me, and just in whatever spare time I can find.  It is far from
> complete.  I have started with a gmail equivalent, since that is where
> Google started, and messaging serves as a good central point to branch out
> from.  It is implemented as a Django app that communicates with a JS/jQuery
> frontend via JSON-RPC calls.  I am hoping that over time it can grow into a
> sort of desktop that lets you get at several apps that can share some common
> facilities and integration.  Think of how all the various services Google
> offers all work together via your Google account.
>
> I was originally targeting virtualized clouds, like Amazon's new micro
> instances.  This code should be able to run fine on a variety of low end
> hardware, so long as it can have a reasonable amount of flash storage.
>  Certainly an Atom (or equivalent) box could handle it.  I also want to try
> this out on some of the $100 variety of ARM plugs, like the PogoPlug.
>
> So I know I am doing a lot of plugging my own project.  I could use some
> advice and collaboration on it, and maybe someday it could sit on top of the
> Freedombox OS.  But regardless of what happens with my project, I wanted to
> open up the discussion about a "cloud desktop", how do we make a user
> experience that is useful to a wide audience.
>
> I live near Danbury CT, so I can always get down to NYC if anything is ever
> going on.  This is an exciting project and I would like to help out.
>
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