SoC: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client
Hi there, First of all, massive congratulations on the 4.7 release!! I'm writing an application for a Drupal Google Summmer of Code project and would like to ask some questions, please tell me if there is a more appropriate place to discuss this. My current favourite proposed SoC project is: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client (http://drupal.org/node/60507) Would an appropriate solution to this be to write a module with functions for administering multiple sites and then write a SOAP/REST/XML-RPC API which is called by the XULRunner client? I'd like to design it so that you can administer multiple sites on multiple servers, all with different databases (sort of scratching my own itch a bit here too). The idea of using an API like this is that anyone could write their own client or custom web app as part of their own systems to manage their Drupal sites. Would anyone mind reading over my application before I submit it? Many Thanks Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On May 2, 2006, at 5:09 AM, Ben Francis wrote:
Hi there,
First of all, massive congratulations on the 4.7 release!!
I'm writing an application for a Drupal Google Summmer of Code project and would like to ask some questions, please tell me if there is a more appropriate place to discuss this.
My current favourite proposed SoC project is: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client (http://drupal.org/node/60507)
Would an appropriate solution to this be to write a module with functions for administering multiple sites and then write a SOAP/REST/XML-RPC API which is called by the XULRunner client?
I'd like to design it so that you can administer multiple sites on multiple servers, all with different databases (sort of scratching my own itch a bit here too). The idea of using an API like this is that anyone could write their own client or custom web app as part of their own systems to manage their Drupal sites.
Would anyone mind reading over my application before I submit it?
Hi Ben, I submitted this application based on the recommendation of Andy Smith. CivicSpace would like to provide this for resellers/ associates of the hosted CivicSpace ASP. I'll run your application by the CivicSpace team and we will find the appropriate mentor for your project. Cheers, Kieran
Many Thanks
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
RE: "CivicSpace would like to provide this for resellers/ associates of the hosted CivicSpace ASP." This is an incredibly useful tool -- will other folks, aside from CivicSpace resellers/associates, be able to use it as well? Thanks, Bill Kieran Lal wrote:
On May 2, 2006, at 5:09 AM, Ben Francis wrote:
Hi there,
First of all, massive congratulations on the 4.7 release!!
I'm writing an application for a Drupal Google Summmer of Code project and would like to ask some questions, please tell me if there is a more appropriate place to discuss this.
My current favourite proposed SoC project is: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client (http://drupal.org/node/60507)
Would an appropriate solution to this be to write a module with functions for administering multiple sites and then write a SOAP/REST/XML-RPC API which is called by the XULRunner client?
I'd like to design it so that you can administer multiple sites on multiple servers, all with different databases (sort of scratching my own itch a bit here too). The idea of using an API like this is that anyone could write their own client or custom web app as part of their own systems to manage their Drupal sites.
Would anyone mind reading over my application before I submit it?
Hi Ben, I submitted this application based on the recommendation of Andy Smith. CivicSpace would like to provide this for resellers/ associates of the hosted CivicSpace ASP. I'll run your application by the CivicSpace team and we will find the appropriate mentor for your project.
Cheers, Kieran
Many Thanks
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Code developed for the Summer of Code is open source, so it'd be available for anyone who would like to use it. On 5/2/06, Bill Fitzgerald <bill@funnymonkeydata.com> wrote:
RE: "CivicSpace would like to provide this for resellers/ associates of the hosted CivicSpace ASP."
This is an incredibly useful tool -- will other folks, aside from CivicSpace resellers/associates, be able to use it as well?
Thanks,
Bill
Kieran Lal wrote:
On May 2, 2006, at 5:09 AM, Ben Francis wrote:
Hi there,
First of all, massive congratulations on the 4.7 release!!
I'm writing an application for a Drupal Google Summmer of Code project and would like to ask some questions, please tell me if there is a more appropriate place to discuss this.
My current favourite proposed SoC project is: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client (http://drupal.org/node/60507)
Would an appropriate solution to this be to write a module with functions for administering multiple sites and then write a SOAP/REST/XML-RPC API which is called by the XULRunner client?
I'd like to design it so that you can administer multiple sites on multiple servers, all with different databases (sort of scratching my own itch a bit here too). The idea of using an API like this is that anyone could write their own client or custom web app as part of their own systems to manage their Drupal sites.
Would anyone mind reading over my application before I submit it?
Hi Ben, I submitted this application based on the recommendation of Andy Smith. CivicSpace would like to provide this for resellers/ associates of the hosted CivicSpace ASP. I'll run your application by the CivicSpace team and we will find the appropriate mentor for your project.
Cheers, Kieran
Many Thanks
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Kieran Lal wrote:
I submitted this application based on the recommendation of Andy Smith. <snip> I'll run your application by the CivicSpace team and we will find the appropriate mentor for your project.
Thanks for the reply! Does the "CivicSpace team" use this mailing list? I notice they have their own list at civicspace-dev@civicspacelabs.org Should I discuss this project on this list or their list? Is Drupal still the mentor organisation for this project and will development take place in the Drupal community or the CivicSpace community? Thanks for your help. Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On May 2, 2006, at 4:49 PM, Ben Francis wrote:
Kieran Lal wrote:
I submitted this application based on the recommendation of Andy Smith. <snip> I'll run your application by the CivicSpace team and we will find the appropriate mentor for your project.
Thanks for the reply!
Does the "CivicSpace team" use this mailing list? I notice they have their own list at civicspace-dev@civicspacelabs.org Should I discuss this project on this list or their list?
Everything will take place in the Drupal community. CivicSpace is a distribution of Drupal. Kieran
Is Drupal still the mentor organisation for this project and will development take place in the Drupal community or the CivicSpace community?
Thanks for your help.
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Is XUL the correct approach? Remember that XUL is Mozilla only, this means users of other browsers (Safari, Internet Explorer, Konqueror) will not be able to use this. Would an AJAX interface be of more widespread use?
Khalid B wrote:
Is XUL the correct approach?
I did wonder this myself, but note that the specification states "XULRunner", which I have interpreted as meaning a cross platform desktop application (like Firefox or Thunderbird) rather than web application. This is the reason I am asking whether writing an API with something like SOAP would be appropriate. This would expose the Drupal module to a desktop client as a web service but also enable anyone to write their own custom web app which calls the API. I may even do this in the future as well. At first, I was a bit dubious, but now that I've thought about it I think this would be a very useful and flexible way of implementing the administration tool to make it useful to a lot of different people (including myself). I would love to have the opportunity to write a PHP module, a web service and a JavaScript/CSS Desktop XUL application - it would be my ideal project. The only question is whether this can all be completed in the allotted time. Regards Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On May 2, 2006, at 6:05 PM, Ben Francis wrote:
Khalid B wrote:
Is XUL the correct approach?
I did wonder this myself, but note that the specification states "XULRunner", which I have interpreted as meaning a cross platform desktop application (like Firefox or Thunderbird) rather than web application.
This is the reason I am asking whether writing an API with something like SOAP would be appropriate.
SOAP is bloated, hence AJAX not AJAS :-) If we can get away with XML-RPC plus javascript that would be better but we can discover the appropriate technologies as we dig in. I'll start connecting you with the appropriate people off-line. Cheers, Kieran
This would expose the Drupal module to a desktop client as a web service but also enable anyone to write their own custom web app which calls the API. I may even do this in the future as well.
At first, I was a bit dubious, but now that I've thought about it I think this would be a very useful and flexible way of implementing the administration tool to make it useful to a lot of different people (including myself).
I would love to have the opportunity to write a PHP module, a web service and a JavaScript/CSS Desktop XUL application - it would be my ideal project. The only question is whether this can all be completed in the allotted time.
Regards
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Kieran Lal wrote:
SOAP is bloated, hence AJAX not AJAS :-)
If we can get away with XML-RPC plus javascript that would be better but we can discover the appropriate technologies as we dig in.
Do you envisage the project involving the creation of a new Drupal module or any PHP coding as well as the XULRunner client itself? In one of your emails you implied that work is already in progress on an XML-RPC API to Drupal of some kind. I was hoping for some PHP coding as well :) Cheers Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On May 3, 2006, at 11:30 AM, Ben Francis wrote:
Kieran Lal wrote:
SOAP is bloated, hence AJAX not AJAS :-)
If we can get away with XML-RPC plus javascript that would be better but we can discover the appropriate technologies as we dig in.
Do you envisage the project involving the creation of a new Drupal module or any PHP coding as well as the XULRunner client itself? In one of your emails you implied that work is already in progress on an XML-RPC API to Drupal of some kind. I was hoping for some PHP coding as well :)
PHP Drupal coding will be necessary I assume. Kieran
Cheers
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On 3-May-06, at 11:50 AM, Kieran Lal wrote:
On May 3, 2006, at 11:30 AM, Ben Francis wrote:
Kieran Lal wrote:
SOAP is bloated, hence AJAX not AJAS :-)
If we can get away with XML-RPC plus javascript that would be better but we can discover the appropriate technologies as we dig in.
Do you envisage the project involving the creation of a new Drupal module or any PHP coding as well as the XULRunner client itself? In one of your emails you implied that work is already in progress on an XML-RPC API to Drupal of some kind. I was hoping for some PHP coding as well :)
PHP Drupal coding will be necessary I assume.
It would look something like this: * drupalremote.module -- defines PHP callbacks that drive XML-RPC calls * XUL piece -- talks XML-RPC that triggers drupalremote PHP callbacks, data transfer in XML passed via XML-RPC -- Boris Mann Vancouver 778-896-2747 San Francisco 415-367-3595 SKYPE borismann http://www.bryght.com
Boris Mann wrote:
It would look something like this: * drupalremote.module -- defines PHP callbacks that drive XML-RPC calls * XUL piece -- talks XML-RPC that triggers drupalremote PHP callbacks, data transfer in XML passed via XML-RPC
Thanks, that's what I thought :D Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On May 3, 2006, at 1:48 PM, Ben Francis wrote:
Boris Mann wrote:
It would look something like this: * drupalremote.module -- defines PHP callbacks that drive XML-RPC calls * XUL piece -- talks XML-RPC that triggers drupalremote PHP callbacks, data transfer in XML passed via XML-RPC
Thanks, that's what I thought :D
Boris and I talked about use cases last night. Multi-site user approval Multi-site comment approval, administration Multi-site spam configuration Multi-site disabling for security seems like low use but critical. Other usecases? Kieran
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Multi-site user approval Multi-site comment approval, administration Multi-site spam configuration Multi-site disabling for security seems like low use but critical.
Other usecases?
partition from a single instance to multiple instances merger from multiple instances to a single instance a mechanism for scoping consistency of configuration state these are all hierarchical pushs of state, i suppose a get, for state change notice, aka syslog, could be useful.
Eric Brunner-Williams wrote:
Other usecases?
* enable/disable modules (possibly what you meant by security) * view logs I aven't really looked into this but we may be limited in some cases by the in-line HTML problem which would mean rewriting some functions as part of the remote adminstration module. Going off on a slight tangent... Would it be overambitious to try and use the client to automate the creation of new drupal sites on a single Drupal installation, by writing new configuration files and populating database tables? Perhaps this is a possible future addition? Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On 3-May-06, at 3:54 PM, Ben Francis wrote:
Eric Brunner-Williams wrote:
Other usecases?
* enable/disable modules (possibly what you meant by security)
I think you should focus on "do often" use cases for a first pass. It's unlikely that people toggle modules on and off a lot, other than when first experimenting.
* view logs
I aven't really looked into this but we may be limited in some cases by the in-line HTML problem which would mean rewriting some functions as part of the remote adminstration module.
Going off on a slight tangent...
Would it be overambitious to try and use the client to automate the creation of new drupal sites on a single Drupal installation, by writing new configuration files and populating database tables? Perhaps this is a possible future addition?
This is interesting. The XUL client as Drupal installer? Kind of like some of the MySQL remote config/admin tools? It's an interesting direction, certainly. -- Boris
Anything that requires repetitive operations to many items. More use cases: - Rarranging the taxonomies by weight, and terms by weight - Rarranging book pages by changing the weights - Editing a lot of nodes to change something commone (e.g. unpublish many nodes, remove sticky or promoted, ...etc.) - Editing a lot of users to change something You get the idea ...
Boris Mann wrote:
This is interesting. The XUL client as Drupal installer? Kind of like some of the MySQL remote config/admin tools? It's an interesting direction, certainly.
I only know a little about XUL. What are the chief advantages it provides over using Javascript and XMLHttpRequest (i.e. AJAX)? A more rich set of widgets? Better event handling? I get the impression XUL is much lighter than Java, but it does not appear to have stateful connections. Or does it? I start having wild fantasies about building thin, lightweight PowerBuilder/VisualBasic-like fancy clients running in Gecko browsers with stateful connections to web servers and see the world as my oyster. :-) So for the XUL n00bs among us (that would be me), what's it buying us here? Thanks, ..chris
Chris Johnson wrote:
What are the chief advantages it provides over using Javascript and XMLHttpRequest (i.e. AJAX)? A more rich set of widgets? Better event handling?
It could do all of those things.
I start having wild fantasies about building thin, lightweight PowerBuilder/VisualBasic-like fancy clients running in Gecko browsers with stateful connections to web servers and see the world as my oyster. :-)
Funny you should say that... The idea is that the client runs under the XULRunner runtime and is a cross-platform desktop application. Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On 5/3/06, Chris Johnson <chris@tinpixel.com> wrote:
Boris Mann wrote:
This is interesting. The XUL client as Drupal installer? Kind of like some of the MySQL remote config/admin tools? It's an interesting direction, certainly.
I only know a little about XUL. What are the chief advantages it provides over using Javascript and XMLHttpRequest (i.e. AJAX)? A more rich set of widgets? Better event handling?
I get the impression XUL is much lighter than Java, but it does not appear to have stateful connections. Or does it?
I start having wild fantasies about building thin, lightweight PowerBuilder/VisualBasic-like fancy clients running in Gecko browsers with stateful connections to web servers and see the world as my oyster. :-)
So for the XUL n00bs among us (that would be me), what's it buying us here?
Chris XUL is cool. See this demo for it to know what it can do. http://www.faser.net/mab/chrome/content/mab.xul My initial objection is that XUL is Mozilla only. With Mozilla having only 10% market share (outside tech community), it is not a solution that is cross browser enough to build things on. However, the new piece of info me is that they made "XULRunner" out of it which is cross platform and browser independant. This *may* change things a bit.
XULRunner does not require firefox (or other Mozilla based browsers) to run. It's a standalone framework for building rich client apps (Yes. even richer then AJAX). It looks sweet and perfect for the job of an admin tool. More info can be found here: http://developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/XULRunner On 5/3/06, Khalid B <kb@2bits.com> wrote:
On 5/3/06, Chris Johnson <chris@tinpixel.com> wrote:
Boris Mann wrote:
This is interesting. The XUL client as Drupal installer? Kind of like some of the MySQL remote config/admin tools? It's an interesting direction, certainly.
I only know a little about XUL. What are the chief advantages it provides over using Javascript and XMLHttpRequest (i.e. AJAX)? A more rich set of widgets? Better event handling?
I get the impression XUL is much lighter than Java, but it does not appear to have stateful connections. Or does it?
I start having wild fantasies about building thin, lightweight PowerBuilder/VisualBasic-like fancy clients running in Gecko browsers with stateful connections to web servers and see the world as my oyster. :-)
So for the XUL n00bs among us (that would be me), what's it buying us here?
Chris
XUL is cool. See this demo for it to know what it can do.
http://www.faser.net/mab/chrome/content/mab.xul
My initial objection is that XUL is Mozilla only. With Mozilla having only 10% market share (outside tech community), it is not a solution that is cross browser enough to build things on.
However, the new piece of info me is that they made "XULRunner" out of it which is cross platform and browser independant.
This *may* change things a bit.
-- ------------------- Colin Brumelle colin@bryght.com http://bryght.com http://mixedcontent.com Cell: 604.351.0547 Office: 604.682.2889 skype/jabber/aim: cbrumelle
Khalid B wrote:
XUL is cool. See this demo for it to know what it can do.
Whoa, dude. No more ugly radio buttons! Let's rewrite Drupal in XUL / PHP. Heh. :-) Seriously -- very interesting technology with a lot of potential. This is just another example of one of the cool benefits of working on Drupal with you all -- one learns so much from being around so many really smart people. Thanks for the replies. ..chris
On 04 May 2006, at 3:59 AM, Chris Johnson wrote:
Seriously -- very interesting technology with a lot of potential. This is just another example of one of the cool benefits of working on Drupal with you all -- one learns so much from being around so many really smart people.
If you use a form_alter, and create custom theme_ functions that return the form array to the xul application, you can use that as a hint to build the interface, and then re-use the _submit functions =) -- Adrian Rossouw Drupal developer and Bryght Guy http://drupal.org | http://bryght.com
On 5/3/06, Khalid B <kb@2bits.com> wrote:
My initial objection is that XUL is Mozilla only. With Mozilla having only 10% market share (outside tech community), it is not a solution that is cross browser enough to build things on.
This is not a client requirement, it's just something that lots of power admins are probably going to use. As we noted yesterday, visits to Drupal.org - and by extension, drupal admins - are a plurality Mozilla based browsers. Given those two points, Firefox' small overall market share seems unimportant.
However, the new piece of info me is that they made "XULRunner" out of it which is cross platform and browser independant.
Browser independent, yes, but would this Drupal admin client also be able to run inside of Firefox? I think most people would prefer installing an extension over installing a whole new application. Greg -- Greg Knaddison | Growing Venture Solutions Denver, CO | http://growingventuresolutions.com Technology Solutions for Communities, Individuals, and Small Businesses
Greg Knaddison - GVS wrote:
Browser independent, yes, but would this Drupal admin client also be able to run inside of Firefox? I think most people would prefer installing an extension over installing a whole new application.
Unless they don't use Firefox in the first place... Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Ben Francis wrote:
Greg Knaddison - GVS wrote:
I think most people would prefer installing an extension over installing a whole new application.
Unless they don't use Firefox in the first place...
I should say that I do agree with you that a Firefox Plugin would be preferable for a lot of people. Luckily, because of the way XUL works I think it would be pretty trivial to turn the application into a Firefox/Mozilla Plugin or even a hosted application. I think the effort is being concentrated on a XULRunner application because it is cross platform and assumes no dependencies on the administrator's system. Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Ben Francis wrote:
Khalid B wrote:
Is XUL the correct approach?
I did wonder this myself, but note that the specification states "XULRunner", which I have interpreted as meaning a cross platform desktop application (like Firefox or Thunderbird) rather than web application.
This is the reason I am asking whether writing an API with something like SOAP would be appropriate. This would expose the Drupal module to a desktop client as a web service but also enable anyone to write their own custom web app which calls the API. I may even do this in the future as well.
At first, I was a bit dubious, but now that I've thought about it I think this would be a very useful and flexible way of implementing the administration tool to make it useful to a lot of different people (including myself).
I would love to have the opportunity to write a PHP module, a web service and a JavaScript/CSS Desktop XUL application - it would be my ideal project. The only question is whether this can all be completed in the allotted time.
I am wondering a bit about this as well. I think that such an application would be very useful, but also quite complicated. I know that David Carrington once made an attempt at an XUL theme. His efforts can be seen here: http://cvs.drupal.org/viewcvs/drupal/contributions/sandbox/thox/xul/ IIRC he didn't develop it further because he found that he had to re-implement a lot of functions. Cheers, Gerhard
On 03 May 2006, at 4:11 AM, Gerhard Killesreiter wrote:
IIRC he didn't develop it further because he found that he had to re-implement a lot of functions.
propably because we have far too much in-line html as well. To make an xul theme one would have to completely extricate _all_ the html. Forms api might actually help a lot in this case, as you can override all forms with a custom theme, and just write your own interpreter / rendered for the fapi structure. -- Adrian Rossouw Drupal developer and Bryght Guy http://drupal.org | http://bryght.com
I would really value some community feedback on my SoC application draft for this project, the deadline is looming: http://ideas.hippygeek.co.uk/wiki/DrupalSoCApplication There will also be an additional page with more information here http://ideas.hippygeek.co.uk/wiki/DrupalAdminClient but that isn't finished yet.
Ben Francis wrote:
There will also be an additional page with more information here
Just thought I'd mention that I've put some more content here, there are now pretty colourful diagrams and everything! Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Fantastic page! I wish all our projects had such nice overview. I imagine you will be thickening it with technical detail and even function signatures. On 5/9/06 10:59 AM, "Ben Francis" <lists@hippygeek.co.uk> wrote:
Ben Francis wrote:
There will also be an additional page with more information here
Just thought I'd mention that I've put some more content here, there are now pretty colourful diagrams and everything!
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Just have to second Moshe's feedback. Nice writeup! And finally, someone's doing something with the powerful publish and subscribe modules. This is gonna be an amazing tool for anyone that manages more than a single Drupal site. Matt Westgate | www.lullabot.com On May 9, 2006, at 10:22 AM, Moshe Weitzman wrote:
Fantastic page! I wish all our projects had such nice overview. I imagine you will be thickening it with technical detail and even function signatures.
On 5/9/06 10:59 AM, "Ben Francis" <lists@hippygeek.co.uk> wrote:
Ben Francis wrote:
There will also be an additional page with more information here
Just thought I'd mention that I've put some more content here, there are now pretty colourful diagrams and everything!
Ben
-- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Hi Ben: On Tue, May 02, 2006 at 01:09:41PM +0100, Ben Francis wrote:
My current favourite proposed SoC project is: Multi-site administration through rich XUL client (http://drupal.org/node/60507)
Would an appropriate solution to this be to write a module with functions for administering multiple sites and then write a SOAP/REST/XML-RPC API which is called by the XULRunner client?
Pardon my piping in so late on this very interesting idea. I have now been working for a year on an application that uses XUL on the front end and PHP on the back. The simplest way to communicate is have the front end use HttpRequest to send a POST that looks something like this when it arrives in PHP: $_POST['json'] = '{"function":"login","parameters":{"name":"foo","password":"bar"}}'; Then extract and decode it into a PHP array (we're using the JSON implementation proposed for PEAR): $request = $json->decode($_POST['json']); You'll now have an array called $request with the function name and parameters in it you can pass into the backend system. For responses, we create PHP arrays that we then throw at an output function that basically does this: echo "var $name = " . $json->encode($data) . ";\n"; Couldn't be simpler. This is WAY WAY WAY easier than XML_RPC, SOAP, etc. I hope your proposal gets accepted. Good luck, --Dan -- T H E A N A L Y S I S A N D S O L U T I O N S C O M P A N Y data intensive web and database programming http://www.AnalysisAndSolutions.com/ 4015 7th Ave #4, Brooklyn NY 11232 v: 718-854-0335 f: 718-854-0409
Daniel Convissor wrote:
Pardon my piping in so late on this very interesting idea.
Don't worry you're not late in the game, the specification for the Admin Client is far from set in stone, let alone the implementation details! I value your feedback.
I have now been working for a year on an application that uses XUL on the front end and PHP on the back.
When you say XUL on the front end do you mean as a desktop client or as a hosted XUL app? I assume the former.
The simplest way to communicate is have the front end use HttpRequest to send a POST
This is interesting because there are many different ways of creating "web services" and I think its important that we create something which is going to be useful to as many Drupal Administrators as possible. For me the most important goal for the server side of this project is to create a remote administration module which is going to be as flexible as possible and allow administrators to manage Drupal websites in their own preferred method. Whilst the XULRunner based client will form the bulk of the SoC project I see it as only one front end to the remote administration module - so the ease of development for the XUL client isn't necessarily the most important deciding factor. However, an important goal for me is defining a project that I can actually complete in the given time frame so I'm not going to ignore simpler implementation ideas. My writeup [1] on this proposal describes an XML-RPC API but that doesn't necessarily have to be how it is implemented. I don't want to open a can of worms here but it seems there is a large debate between resource oriented architectures and action oriented architectures (e.g. REST and RPC architectures respectively) of creating an API. There's also the possibility of using Json instead of XML, personally I'm leaning towards XML for reasons of flexibility rather than efficiency. I think this is the time to be discussing fundamental architecture issues like these. 1. http://ideas.hippygeek.co.uk/wiki/DrupalAdminClient Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Hi all, Unfortunately, despite a huge amount of effort on my application and lots of encouragement from the community (thank you), I didn't get accepted for the Google Summer of Code this year. The odds were against me. If anyone is interested I can move the content of my wiki page (http://ideas.hippygeek.co.uk/wiki/DrupalAdminClient) to somewhere useful on the Drupal site if there's anywhere useful for it to go. That's probably only relevent if there isn't another student taking up this project though because they probably have their own take on it :) Hopefully I can still find time to do some work on Drupal this summer, I've got an idea for an admin module which can register domain names and create drupal sites automatically from a single install. But unfortunately my main priority will be earning some cash. I just have a suggestion about the remote admin API for the XUL client. It seems to me that a content management system lends itself very well to a RESTful API. Each node could be a resource which you can GET, PUT or POST to. For a crude example, for the Multi-site user approval use case, there could be a * [HTTP GET] http://example.com/user/?enabled=0 to get a list of disabled users and a * [HTTP PUT] http://example.com/user/2 to update the enabled status of user 2 for example. To disable a module for security reasons, you could do a PUT to update its enabled status. *[HTTP PUT] http://example.com/admin/module/1 To view the logs on a website you could GET like this: * [HTTP GET] http://example.com/admin/logs You get the idea. The only problem with this approach is that I suspect it could be quite difficult because it would require modifications to lots of modules, correct me if I'm wrong. For this reason it may be easier to develop a procedural based API like XML_RPC, or send a function with a simple POST like Daniel suggested: $_POST['json'] = '{"function":"login","parameters":{"name":"foo","password":"bar"}}'; Cheers -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
Ben, you had an excellent application and we sure wish that we could have accepted it as well. Believe me that the decision was tough. There might be some other entities besides Google who are willing to sponsor work on this... it might be worthwhile for you to shop around a bit and see. cheers, Robert
Robert Douglass wrote:
you had an excellent application and we sure wish that we could have accepted it as well. Believe me that the decision was tough. There might be some other entities besides Google who are willing to sponsor work on this... it might be worthwhile for you to shop around a bit and see.
Thank you :) I'm alredy preparing my CV. Just one question, how would me working on the client (and module) work, alongside Lê Xuân Hùng who was accepted for the project under SoC? I was told that with Drupal more than one student may work on a SoC project, but on the Google Summer of Code Mentor FAQ it states that students can not collaborate on a project. What role could I take outside of SoC? I get the impression that the student is not really allowed input on their project from the community in terms of code, the project has to be clearly defined and all their own work. How could I usefully contribute without interfering with his project? Thanks Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
On 5/24/06, Ben Francis <lists@hippygeek.co.uk> wrote:
Robert Douglass wrote:
you had an excellent application and we sure wish that we could have accepted it as well. Believe me that the decision was tough. There might be some other entities besides Google who are willing to sponsor work on this... it might be worthwhile for you to shop around a bit and see.
Thank you :) I'm alredy preparing my CV.
Just one question, how would me working on the client (and module) work, alongside Lê Xuân Hùng who was accepted for the project under SoC? I was told that with Drupal more than one student may work on a SoC project, but on the Google Summer of Code Mentor FAQ it states that students can not collaborate on a project.
What role could I take outside of SoC? I get the impression that the student is not really allowed input on their project from the community in terms of code, the project has to be clearly defined and all their own work. How could I usefully contribute without interfering with his project?
It's a good question...hopefully we can get some clarification from Robert Douglass here. I'm going to contact some people I know at ActiveState -- who do nothing but XUL work -- and see if they might want to sponsor you to do some XUL work, whether related to Drupal or note. -- Boris Mann Vancouver 778-896-2747 San Francisco 415-367-3595 Skype borismann http://www.bryght.com
Boris Mann wrote:
It's a good question...hopefully we can get some clarification from Robert Douglass here.
Robert Douglass hasn't made any comment yet, but I'm not terribly hopeful looking at CVS http://cvs.drupal.org/viewcvs/drupal/contributions/modules/drupman/ It looks like the thing was mostly written before Summer of Code started to me. The screenshots date back to May 6th http://www.flickr.com/photos/11839648@N00/tags/drupal/ At least I know for next year the best tactic is to write something first, then apply. Is there any interest in a module which allows users to create an account and create a an entire Drupal site automatically from a core installation? Perhaps in conjunction with domain registration. Does Bryght already do this? Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk
participants (16)
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Adrian Rossouw -
Ben Francis -
Bill Fitzgerald -
Boris Mann -
Breyten Ernsting -
Chris Johnson -
Colin Brumelle -
Daniel Convissor -
Eric Brunner-Williams -
Gerhard Killesreiter -
Greg Knaddison - GVS -
Khalid B -
Kieran Lal -
Matt Westgate -
Moshe Weitzman -
Robert Douglass