Re: Aggregating blog posts?
Igal Koshevoy
more appropriate given the technically-oriented nature of this discussion}
John Poelstra wrote:
> My overall idea here is creating a sense of community via the blogs
> for people involved with Open Source Bridge. It wouldn't be open to
> the entire world, but anyone could join who is a registered conference
> attendee, volunteer, or speaker. This could be a useful resource to
> people associated with the conference who want to learn more about
> each other. Could it also be a central outlet for the media to follow
> all related OSB blogs in one place?
>
If someone can volunteer to own this effort, we could do this. I don't
have the time to lead this effort or research, but will work with
someone that does to make this happen. The more someone can volunteer to
support this, in terms of planning and technology, the easier it will be
for us to add this.
> Collecting the URLs/RSS feeds:
> 1) I thought we were requesting them from each of the speakers in the
> acceptance email.
> --Is this list handy and who should I contact to get it?
>
Once there's an agreement on the action to take and how this fits in
with current emails being sent, I can provide you with the list.
> 2) Could we add a couple of fields to the conference registration form?
> --"Add your blog to http://planet.opensourcebridge.org/ so other
> people can learn about you and your projects"
> --Is it too late/hard to change the registration form
>
Adding fields to the outsourced conference registration system is
painful and undesirable, and wouldn't help people that already
registered. We'd be better off providing our own web interface for this.
> 3) Set up a simple form somewhere on the main site to collect: Name,
> email address, and RSS feed for people we already missed?
> --this form would route an email to me with the information
>
The OCW conference software already provides us with fields for tracking
speaker's contact information and public links to their websites, blogs,
Twitter and Identi.ca accounts. I'd prefer to use, improve and leverage
the system for tracking identities that we already have, rather than add
another one if possible. Here's an example of what a profile looks like:
http://opensourcebridge.org/users/1
If we want to capture the ATOM/RSS feed for each person's blog, we could
add another field and optionally some logic to help extract it using
autodiscovery from the blog URL that we're already providing.
> Hosting the aggregator:
> I did some asking around and this was suggested: http://www.planetplanet.org/
>
> Igal--is this something that could be hosted on the existing virtual
> instance? What OS are you running? The basic requirement is python.
>
> Maitaining the aggregator:
> Names and RSS feeds have to added manually to an ini file. I'd be
> glad to volunteer to maintain this file which would ideally be kept in
> version control and then pushed to the server via script that I can
> run myself (without needing access to anything else on the box and for
> security) or something like sudo?
The Bridge servers run Ubuntu 8.04 and are already running Python 2.5.2
to support existing applications. I've published the complete
instructions and code for setting a development server if interested:
http://github.com/igal/osbp_automateit/tree/master
If you think PlanetPlanet is the right software, then I'd like someone
to setup the app on their own Linux box and get to know it. I'd then
want them to provide us with complete enough information so that we can
follow it and setup this up on the production servers:
1. List of Ubuntu packages to install.
2. List of Python eggs to install.
3. Step-by-step commands to setup the aggregator.
4. Recommended configuration files for the aggregator.
5. Instructions on how to add/remove a subscription.
6. Wrapper to provide automated way to add/remove subscriptions.
7. Theme file to style the aggregator. {Reid?}
8. Explanation of how to run the aggregator web application, or is it
just generating HTML files?
9. Text for this app's homepage that explains what it is and that
Bridge is not endorsing or liable for the silly things people say
on their blogs.
I cannot just give you root access to tinker with these servers, I need
to know the above information and steps so I can automate the setup process.
While I can help with some of these tasks, someone else needs to
spearhead the overall effort because I must spend my limited time
focused on adding features to OCW. The more someone can own this
aggregator effort, the sooner it'll be done and the better it'll be.
-igal
M. Edward (Ed) Borasky
my HostMonster account, I'd be happy to host Open Source Bridge
aggregators on my two main web sites, borasky-research.net and
linuxcapacityplanning.com. They're both pretty much stock Drupal but I
am a total Drupal novice and haven't figured out how to make cPanel
work.
M. Edward (Ed) Borasky
http://www.linkedin.com/in/edborasky
I've never met a happy clam. In fact, most of them were pretty steamed.
Igal Koshevoy
Thank you for the offer, but no. Bridge has production servers and they work fine. This is not about hosting.
I'm asking for help with setting up an unfamiliar application because I don't have time to understand how it works myself. For specifics, please see the list of things I need assistance with at the bottom of my original email below.
-igal
Amy Farrell
for step 7. I don't have any background with PlanetPlanet specifically,
but I do have enough Ubuntu and python background to dig into it.
However, I can't commit any time until Monday. So if someone else wants
to take a crack at it before then, speak up!
- Amy
Igal Koshevoy
All: If you can team up with Amy on this, I think this would be quicker, easier and more fun.
FYI: The steps I listed are my best guess of what will be necessary to automate and deploy a completed solution to production. You do NOT need to complete all of these to help out. I do NOT expect you to put together a fully automated recipe of these either. Basically, the more of these you can do, the better, but I recognize that some steps may be tricky -- like the application for managing subscriptions -- and I will gladly meet you somewhere halfway on completing this.
-igal
Selena Deckelmann
> Amy: Thank you, that'd be great.
> Amy Farrell wrote:
>> I could take on most of the PlanetPlanet investigation, except probably
>> for step 7. I don't have any background with PlanetPlanet specifically,
>> but I do have enough Ubuntu and python background to dig into it.
Amy: I've participated in writing an update to Planet that runs in
Python (using Django) and has an automated way of adding contributors,
with an admin interface.
We may be able to use that code. So I'll look into the requirements and
try to fill out some of Igal's list before Monday.
-selena
Igal Koshevoy
> Amy Farrell wrote:
>>> I could take on most of the PlanetPlanet investigation, except probably
>>> for step 7. I don't have any background with PlanetPlanet specifically,
>>> but I do have enough Ubuntu and python background to dig into it.
>>>
>
> Amy: I've participated in writing an update to Planet that runs in
> Python (using Django) and has an automated way of adding contributors,
> with an admin interface.
>
> We may be able to use that code. So I'll look into the requirements and
> try to fill out some of Igal's list before Monday.
provide us a link to the management tool if it's open source? Also,
because Planet has been around for a while, there are probably some
alternative web apps for managing its subscriptions that would be worth
reviewing.
-igal