[Freedombox-discuss] Freedom Box client device software

[Boaz]

Standard disclaimer: non-developer's thoughts follow.


The Freedom Box, as we all know, is a boring beige box which sits in
the corner of the room, always on but rarely noticed, collecting dust
and quietly plugging away serving your services while you and your
other computing device(s) sleep.

It's a server, and it has no interface, no key board, mouse, screen,
nothing.  So you interact with it using one or more other computing
devices, through an encrypted tunnel, over a local network or the
internet.

The Freedom Box must be always on, always and forever on, because it
must always be available to act on your behalf, representing you to
your contacts out on the public internet.  As I see it, this
necessarily invalidates any proposal involving a “portable” Freedom
Box that isn't always always on.  Or how do other people see it?

But the device(s) you use to interact with your Freedom Box can be
switched off; they need be on only when you are using them.

To me all this implies that there are really two halves to our job.
One, we must write the server software, the Freedom Box itself.  Two,
we must write the client application, the interface.  Or how do other
people see it?

I envision these two parts as fully separable:
1. The Freedom Box is just a server for all the communication
protocols that Freedom Box supports. For example, it's a mail server.
It can be accessed by the Freedom Box's dedicated interface
application.  But, in its capacity as a mail server, it can also be
accessed by any mail client.  This enables a user to use his Freedom
Box for just one or two specific purposes while continuing to use the
client software he's already used to, if that's all a user wants out
of his Freedom Box for now.
2. The interface application is just a client for all the
communication protocols that Freedom Box supports.  For example, it's
a mail client.  It can access mail on the Freedom Box.  But, in its
capacity as a mail client, it can also access mail on any mail server.
 This readily allows users to use an account for one, some, or all of
the protocols that make up the Freedom Box's capabilities, on a
friend's Freedom Box or a commercial provider (not ideal, but it
should be an option).

The Freedom Box, we've agreed, is Debian (yes, there's not total
agreement; some think it ought to be a “Debian derived distribution”,
with packages not in Debian stable, while others think it ought to be
Debian “pure blend”, including packages only from Debian stable, but
it's agreed that it's based on Debian).

But for the interface application, not so.  Not everyone uses Debian,
or would be willing to switch just to have a Freedom Box.  This leads
me to the conclusion that the interface application will have to be
written for the operating systems that people already use, including,
unfortunately, unfree ones.

It's kind of a strange thought, someone tapping out a message in a
window on his Microsoft Windows powered laptop, this window being the
interface to his Debian powered Freedom Box.  But I can't see any way
around it if we want Freedom Box to take off.  Am I missing something?


Boaz