Local-first software (2019)

Post by scarface74 » Sun, Aug 02, 2020, 2:37 PM UTC

iagovar wrote: post #25

ramraj07 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Netflix is always the perfect example against this weird logic. They commited to AWS, and stuck with it even after Amazon itself is one of their prime competitors. They clearly decided that infra and devops is not their core competency and have absolved themselves of that responsibility and are ready to pay a premium for it. On the other side we have people who keep patting themselves in their back about their Emacs…

Just for being that guy: AFAIK Netflix has some caching devices that were pretty much home baked with FreeBSD and some other goodies. Can't remember the name, but I know they sit them in exchanges directly to ISPs. IIRC they were only using AWS for storing content with low frequency access.

Post by eternalban » Sun, Aug 02, 2020, 2:39 PM UTC

sukilot wrote: post #22

eternalban wrote: post #4

I skimmed the desired qualities, the review of current tools, and finally the software centric approach to achieving the stated goals. While we can reasonably expect software elements in any proposed solution, the hardware and physical elements of distributed computing may provide a far simpler pathway and likely will permit much greater reuse of existing proven software approaches. For example, all future multi-unit…

What's the point of putting an amateur-run data center in every apartment building instead of using a proper one in town? Or instead of just putting it in my unit (with off-site backup of course), since a personal data center is just a single computer? My landlord can barely run the water and A/C; no way they can run IT. The improved quality and reliability is worth it for the trivial latency cost.

Post by Nextgrid » Sun, Aug 02, 2020, 2:49 PM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #30

WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #2

Unfortunately local-first software is incompatible with you being a slave to your preferred technology company of choice (Facebook, Apple, Google, Microsoft). If it wasn't for GDPR, most of these companies wouldn't even offer exports of your data.

And now with GDPR I have an annoying “we use cookies” splash page every time I visit a web page. Win???

Post by hinkley » Sun, Aug 02, 2020, 2:57 PM UTC

fastball wrote: post #24

pferde wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a step between peer to peer and centralized, and that is federated. For most services, that should be the sweet spot.

How do you federate a video call with 10 people? Federation isn't needed because you don't need to have servers that communicate with each other, you just need some server that can host a given video call. So any open source solution works, no federation architecture is required.

Post by AriaMinaei » Sun, Aug 02, 2020, 3:04 PM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #29

elmo2you wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many far smarter people have said this before, far more eloquently than I can, but in short: Cloud Computing (and SASS even more so) is little more than just another attempt to recreate access/info monopolies, essentially the same profit proposition as existed with closed source software, while pretending to be one of the cool kids and use politically more acceptable (but in this context rather meaningless) terms lik…

What do you propose? That every company reinvent the wheel or host everything locally even if it’s not their core competency? Every company has to decide what its “unfair advantage” is and concentrate on that.