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Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

scuttlebot.io

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Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#61

Post by Vendan »

TimJRobinson wrote: post #56
Vendan wrote: post #31

Scuttlebutt is a neat concept, burdened by a bad protocol. Signing a message involves serializing a json object, signing it, adding the signature as a field on that json object, and then serializing it again. To verify, you deserialize the message into an object, remove the signature field, and then reserialize it, and verify the signature against that new serialization. This means that all the clients have to have a…

Once someone has written a library to do this correctly in Go/Rust/Whatever isn't this problem solved? Everyone building scuttlebutt apps with that language can use that library. It didn't seem like this protocol is changing.

I tried, and tried, and tried to make that library for Go. I failed, cause of serialization issues too involved for it to be worth it to me (got to the point where I'd have to write my own json implementation)

Just giving people the heads-up that JS seemingly is the only blessed language for scuttlebutt

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#62

Post by crispyporkbites »

Vendan wrote: post #31

Scuttlebutt is a neat concept, burdened by a bad protocol. Signing a message involves serializing a json object, signing it, adding the signature as a field on that json object, and then serializing it again. To verify, you deserialize the message into an object, remove the signature field, and then reserialize it, and verify the signature against that new serialization. This means that all the clients have to have a…

I’ve had similar, albeit easy to solve, problems with key formats when signing emails.

But that isn’t a reason why scuttlebutt isn’t more popular. It only takes one Go implementation and the problem is solved permanently.

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#63

Post by crispyporkbites »

camdenlock wrote: post #26
cachestash wrote: post #22

npm install sigh...

Yeah, this is where I lost interest too.

I don’t understand why npm install is so bad here? It’s just a package manager. It’s not hard to write your implementation without npm if you prefer.

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#64

Post by monocasa »

Vendan wrote: post #57
mouldysammich wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

could it use a HTTPHeader style system instead to avoid the json serializing back and forth?

Just serialize, sign, pack the signature and the raw bytes of the serialization. Doesn't matter how, just gotta pack the raw bytes, not futz with it

You can even have a JSON object containing base64 fields for message and signature if you feel it really needs to be JSON all the way down for whatever reason.

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#65

Post by dduane »

z0mbie42 wrote: post #17
kseistrup wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been on SSB for some 3 years (with some breaks when I had enough of npm). Once you're onboarded it works like a charm: exchange of data between peers works swiftly and efficiently, to the extend that you can even use it for realtime chat the way IRC works. The community is colourful and friendly, and the signal to noise ratio is high. I've learned a lot about fermentation and growing mushrooms and living off-gri…

Thank you! The lack of multi-device support isn't too much cumbersome? Also, do you not fear, due to the gossip protocol, that your private messages may be stored forever by peers and one day, your private key leaks, and all your conversations are publicly exposed?

Not as much as I fear this from Facebook

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#67

Post by masukomi »

Vendan wrote: post #31

Scuttlebutt is a neat concept, burdened by a bad protocol. Signing a message involves serializing a json object, signing it, adding the signature as a field on that json object, and then serializing it again. To verify, you deserialize the message into an object, remove the signature field, and then reserialize it, and verify the signature against that new serialization. This means that all the clients have to have a…

there is work on C, Go, and Rust versions. It runs in iOS and Android. So, yeah, not so much "tied into node.js". Yes, that's where the majority of the work is, but...

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#68

Post by Skinney »

Vendan wrote: post #31

Scuttlebutt is a neat concept, burdened by a bad protocol. Signing a message involves serializing a json object, signing it, adding the signature as a field on that json object, and then serializing it again. To verify, you deserialize the message into an object, remove the signature field, and then reserialize it, and verify the signature against that new serialization. This means that all the clients have to have a…

This might actually improve in the near future: https://github.com/ssbc/ssb-spec-drafts/blob/master/drafts/d...

Re: Scuttlebot: Peer-to-peer database, identity provider, and messaging system

#69

Post by masukomi »

dang wrote: post #14

A thread from 2017: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14409187 Points to https://scuttlebutt.nz/ which is related

This HN post is linking to the protocol docs. Scuttlebutt.nz is about the social network built on top of them. More importantly it's the most significant thing that uses the protocol. The "apps" that use the protocol are, in practice, just plugins that work in one particular app (somewhat geeky app) and that particular app is primarily a client for the social network.
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