Forums and Threaded Discussions Task Force

@julian Well, there are object types that Mastodon couldn't even handle if it wanted to. For example, it doesn't have anything to handle an Event-type object with. I don't think Gargron would build an event calendar into Mastodon just for Event-type objects, not unless enough people pester him to do just that.#FediMeta #FediverseMeta #CWFediMeta #CWFediverseMeta #Mastodon

Reminder that the ForumWG meeting is coming up in one hour.

@erincandescent @trwnh @evan @jenniferplusplus @mikedev @scott @julian @trwnhThe name of the property could be different, but I think it is useful to have two collections:- "Thread" is easier to implement, and in any case, software needs to keep track of reply trees, one way or another.- "Context" is a bonus. It contains everything related to a conversation, including reactions and edits. Some applications may not need it, and for some it might be difficult to implement, so it should be optional.My estimation is that implementation of "Context" + "Thread" will require roughly the same amount of effort as implementation of "Context" alone, so for those who want "Context" this separation should not be a problem. If software doesn't keep track of activities it can provide empty "Context", but their Add activities should nevertheless have it in target. Perhaps in the following form:"target": { "type": "Context", "id": "<context-collection>", "attributedTo": "<conversation-owner>", "thread": "<thread-collection>" }

@julian @thisismissem @silverpill which is to say: audience is what decides which objects you are even *aware* of, before you even get around to grouping them logically.in a centralized system you would query for all objects in the database where the context was what you wanted, and where the audience included you.in a decentralized system you work off of what’s in your inbox, and “follow your nose” to the context, which may have its own audience.

Having a separate thread property may be useful. One possible use case would be where threads or posts are labelled or categorized or placed in a list, and this is exposed as a context.In that case, the thread and the context would be different. cc: @Evan Prodromou @Sean Tilley @julian @Darius Kazemi

@[email protected] sorry, I invited somebody else in my address book haha

@julian Yes, it was me. Thank you, I figured it was the one by Mr. Mike, thank you

@silverpill @mikedev @julian the default assumption should not be "full representation", because you can never have the entire set of knowable facts about a given subject.what we should strive for instead is to make sure that any representation served is useful. this is not the same thing as it being "full". for example, there may be private attributes that are not being served.

While discussing what is contained in the context collection, I'd like to clarify what exactly is being Add'ed in 400e and (the upcoming) 171b, and whether that also coincides with the collection items. That is, if a context collection contains only simple objects, then the assumption is that context owner will only federate an Add out for simple objects. Likewise if the collection contains activities, then I'd expect Add(Like(Note)) to come from that owner. However, a quick re-reading of 400e suggests that only simply objects are federated out via Add. That would tip the scale a bit toward the context containing only objects.

@dariusk I may be overly optimistic, but I'd like to move forward thinking that perhaps that was then and this is now. Let's chat tomorrow (?) about the merits of your implementation and see whether we can make some waves!

@eeeee don't engage, some people will always be unhappy unless they get everything for free.

@[email protected] thank you!

@julian @alex-mehr @trwnh>There's no guarantee that a collection would present items in chronological vs. reverse chronological order — are you checking the timestamps and reversing as needed?The ordering can be specified by some property of Collection>Wouldn't you need to paginage through the entire collection anyway?The client will fetch pages until it finds an item that has already been processed.> I think that informs why I set up topic synchronization in this manner, and why my idea of context collections contain only objects; to me, activities don't really mean much at all.I'd prefer context to be a collection of objects too, as long as there's a way to retrieve activity history.Activity-based sync seems more natural to me. I think ActivityPub can be better understood not as a protocol for social networking, but as a distributed database where nodes sync datasets by sending messages over the network. Messages are activities, datasets are collections. When I send a Follow activity and your server responds with an Accept, followers and following collections are updated on both sides (or their equivalents if you don't store activities and collections). More generally, any activity delivery can be viewed as a synchronization of outbox collection.I think such change of perspective can greatly improve DX and provide a solid foundation for further protocol extensions

ForumWG meeting in ~1 hour N.B. We are deferring discussion on 1b12 vs 400e as @[email protected] is currently mid-flight, but will continue to discuss resolvable context, backfill, and syncing. There will be time for an open floor to discuss new topics, so if you have any ideas that may benefit the forum and threaded discussions sector of the fediverse, you are welcome to bring them up! Meeting Link

I am interested in this topic. Please add me to relevant groups/calls. My mastodon ID is: @[email protected] How do I catch up on the current state of things? All I know is that Mastodon and some other software allows subscribing to hashtags: https://fedi.tips/how-do-i-follow-hashtags-on-mastodon-and-the-fediverse/ But this is neither universal nor sufficient. Each community might use different hashtags for different "topics".

Hi,Thanks for sharing this information.

Just a follow up reminder that there is no ForumWG meeting this month. See you all next month!

I think the answer to that has to be that you have to take whatever context is associated with the object you're sent as canonical. Otherwise we'll always be second-guessing. The context on the object of the first object in whatever collection you resolve could also be "wrong". Yes, practically speaking, this may lead to errors in certain cases, however I think that's better than making the context overly relative.**edit I guess in this case, practically speaking, you'd follow up with the implementer of whatever platform is being used to resolve the context you initially got and ask them to fix their issue

I've also added FEP 1b12 announces for additional activities: Create Update Like Undo(Like) Delete Confirming that at least Discourse accepted the Announce(Like(Note)) and parsed it correctly.