3 ms·

Why not integrate an open-source system like Firefox Sync?

drdaeman 8y ago
Because it's a total mess. I've worked on a protocol re-implementation for personal use, and I assure you it's quite ugly. And it's a moving target that changes once in a while, so supporting that is essentially being at Mozilla's mercy. Mozilla's Kinto could do the trick, though. I haven't dug inside but protocol-wise it looks quite good to my personal tastes. I believe this is what actually Mozilla wants to eventually switch Sync to. And if sync can be done with dumb backend storing encrypted blobs, then WebDAV is the most ubiquitous and simple option. Although it lacks realtime notifications which are quite important for sync.
- hadrien01 8y ago
  Are you talking about Sync-1.1 or Sync-1.5 (post-2016)?
  - drdaeman 8y ago
    Sync-1.5 and Accounts. I used to run Sync-1.0 and it was okay. At least I didn't have to bother about protocol details. And now, even though it's FLOSS, it's still unmaintained abandonware so I don't think it's a good target. 1.5 is very different to 1.0. Just consider the fact that to log in to Accounts and use Sync you need to use three auth protocols: HAWK, OAuth2 and BrowserID. And serve a webpage with some custom JS (that iOS version for some reason would reject to load). And Sync alone is full of proprietary[1] stuff like X-Weave-Timestamp headers, application/newlines MIME type (seriously, not even a vendor extension), etc. It could've easily been WebDAV plus a few small protocol extensions where things didn't fit well. It is not. ____ [1] "Proprietary" as in "unique to this project, neither used by anything else, nor usable by anything else because it's poorly documented moving target without change warnings" not as in "non-FLOSS".
- PurpleRamen 8y ago
  Realtime-notification could be implementad as an optional service running besides the dumb storage, triggered by whatever. It's not that bookmark-sync is so important for most people that they cannot wait some minutes till a periodical checker fetches the updates.
  - drdaeman 8y ago
    Sync is not just about bookmarks, but also about open tabs and passwords. I'd say it's quite desirable for one's phone to immediately catch up with their desktop. Open the same site using the tab list, have the password ready, etc.

Because it's a total mess. I've worked on a protocol re-implementation for personal use, and I assure you it's quite ugly. And it's a moving target that changes once in a while, so supporting that is essentially being at Mozilla's mercy. Mozilla's Kinto could do the trick, though. I haven't dug inside but protocol-wise it looks quite good to my personal tastes. I believe this is what actually Mozilla wants to eventually switch Sync to. And if sync can be done with dumb backend storing encrypted blobs, then WebDAV is the most ubiquitous and simple option. Although it lacks realtime notifications which are quite important for sync.

hadrien01 8y ago
Are you talking about Sync-1.1 or Sync-1.5 (post-2016)?
- drdaeman 8y ago
  Sync-1.5 and Accounts. I used to run Sync-1.0 and it was okay. At least I didn't have to bother about protocol details. And now, even though it's FLOSS, it's still unmaintained abandonware so I don't think it's a good target. 1.5 is very different to 1.0. Just consider the fact that to log in to Accounts and use Sync you need to use three auth protocols: HAWK, OAuth2 and BrowserID. And serve a webpage with some custom JS (that iOS version for some reason would reject to load). And Sync alone is full of proprietary[1] stuff like X-Weave-Timestamp headers, application/newlines MIME type (seriously, not even a vendor extension), etc. It could've easily been WebDAV plus a few small protocol extensions where things didn't fit well. It is not. ____ [1] "Proprietary" as in "unique to this project, neither used by anything else, nor usable by anything else because it's poorly documented moving target without change warnings" not as in "non-FLOSS".
PurpleRamen 8y ago
Realtime-notification could be implementad as an optional service running besides the dumb storage, triggered by whatever. It's not that bookmark-sync is so important for most people that they cannot wait some minutes till a periodical checker fetches the updates.
- drdaeman 8y ago
  Sync is not just about bookmarks, but also about open tabs and passwords. I'd say it's quite desirable for one's phone to immediately catch up with their desktop. Open the same site using the tab list, have the password ready, etc.