Re: Online Desktop integration ideas

[Alexander Boström <abo kth se>]

sön 2007-07-22 klockan 10:26 -0400 skrev Havoc Pennington:

> I think when possible, it can be nicer to store stuff online via the 
> online app that edits it - e.g. store photos on Flickr, rather than 
> store photos in a remote filesystem or something.

I thought OD really wasn't at all about moving the home directory to a server, but about making the desktop integrate nicely with the services that are already out there. But both concepts are very much worthwhile. It might be good for everyone to keep the difference in mind, though.

> Maybe have a gvfs/fuse mount for "documents" and encourage word 
> processor type apps to save there, but have it separate from the 
> homedir, and manage the homedir more via syncing?

Instead of replacing the Documents folder, it might be better to only encourage applications to make use of online services for storing and sharing documents. That has the advantage of allowing domain- or application-specific solutions for versioning, merging and so on.

AbiCollab is a good example, but also OO.o, with support for an online versioning file system, could prompt the user that "Someone published a new version of this document while this computer was offline. Would you like to merge?"

Then applications which do not support this can keep using the Documents folder and it might be synced/shared/whatever as best as the system can, along with the rest of the (shared parts of the) home directory.

Hmm... But on the other hand, it would still be nice to have the documents from the various online document storage services visible in the documents folder.

> > Should there be an offline snapshot of the Online Desktop profile? When
> > should it sync, during login/logout? Should it be deleted upon logout?
> > Could it have options to keep offline snapshot until next reboot or for x
> > days?
>
> For the file-based stuff, sync on login makes sense to me, and then try 
> to stay in sync during the session periodically?

That really depends on what you're trying to achieve. A few cases:

• Don't put the desktop online, leave that to offices with the right file server infrastructure only. Then just make a cool desktop with web services support.

• Get enough of the desktop online so the user can access documents, pictures and such from a browser. Try to keep data in web services as per above, and then maybe just lazily try to keep everything that's left in xdg-user-dirs in sync with some online storage which also has web access. What about multiple computers sharing the same profile? Synchronisation is a hard problem in general. Maybe just use unison here?

• Actually make the desktop mobile. Log in anywhere using an Online Desktop enabled OS and get a familiar view. Now you'll start needing a GUI for specifying what not to upload. "You're getting close to filling your storage quota, consider deleting something or marking it as local to this computer."

Ok, but say you want to keep a folder online anyway. There are three models:

Network filsystem. Can be slow, but adding a smart cache can help a lot.

Sync it. Like unison. Disadvantage: Doesn't work if the local storage is smaller than the server space. And it takes a while download it all to a new device.

A layered filsystem. Some parts on a server, some parts in local storage, as much as possible in both. Keep trying to upload stuff to the server. Keep some free space on the local storage by deleting stuff that's been uploaded and isn't being used. This can be made to look almost like a network filesystem if you're really diligent about uploading stuff, but a more suitable model is perhaps one where offline writes are allowed, but you try to keep only one machine at a time doing that, to avoid resync problems.

/abo