Blogging Roller

Jim Grisanzio is doing a great job of tracking the Solaris 10 and OpenSolaris press coverage. IMHO, we need to hook Jim up with a more attractive Roller theme.

Phil Windley: Traction positions teampage as a "time-ordered journal" as opposed to a "personal podium." This is really just marketing to position themselves "above" the blogging world as a "serious piece of enterprise IT software." The thing walks like a blog, talks like a blog and looks like a blog.

But Phil goes on to explain that Traction TeamPage is not just run-of-the-mill blog software putting on airs. Traction is "system for using multiple blogs in concert" that gives users the ability to create custom newsfeeds, filtered by metadata such as category and keyword, and to combine newsfeeds, also based on metadata, to create aggregated team blogs and dashboard blogs (see also my Development dashblog post).

Sun blogger Akihito Fujii's Weblog has Roller up and running on the Sun Java app server.

I made this proposal -- a new Atom server implementation for Roller and Rome -- on the Roller mailing list and nobody objected, but I didn't get a lot of feedback.

Noniko, who blogs on JRoller and Netbeans.jp, has created a a Japanese translation of the Roller user interface and now she is working on Japanese translations of the Roller user guide, quick start guide. and installation guides. She has posted some notes on her work.

Now that Roller 1.0 is almost complete, I've been thinking about what comes next. One of the most obvious next steps is weblog entry metadata and a better weblog entry plugin facility to support that metadata. I wrote this up as a short proposal. It needs work and your feedback is welcome (here or on the Roller dev list).

Finally!

Roller 1.0 RC1 is available for testing. Read all about it on the Roller Project Blog.

<img src="http://rollerweblogger.org/images/rollerbadge.png" alt="Powered by Roller" align="right" border="0" style="padding:10px" /> To set the Roller 1.0 release apart I created a new color scheme, new banner, and a new badge. You can see the new color scheme and banner on the main page of this site.

It sure would be nice to get a real web designer to help out with the Roller theme. I'm able to create designs that almost pass as professional, but are far from inspiring. And wouldn't it be nice to have a real logo like the beautiful one Matt scored for AppFuse?

I created a branch for Roller 1.0 and we are now working towards a Roller 1.0RC1 release this week. Before the RC1 release, I hope to update the Installation Guide and to write up a summary of the many changes that we've made since the last release - which was 0.9.8.3. After the RC1 release, I will work on testing, updating the User Guide, and creating a HSQLDB-based standalone demo release. Once we're happy with a Roller 1.0 RC on blogs.sun.com (and jroller.com), we'll release Roller 1.0.

Roller 1.0 is essentially same code base that is currently running on jroller.com, plus security, spam control, and user admin features needed for blogs.sun.com. Roller 1.0 has not yet been deployed either jroller.com or blogs.sun.com, but I hope to upgrade both sites before the final 1.0 release.

I met my stretch goal last week, which was to implement metaWeblog.newMediaObject. NewMediaObject makes it easy to upload images from a blog client such as Ecto or MarsEdit (and I've tested it with both).

Another stretch goal was to upgrade Roller's experimental Atom feed support to support Atom 0.3, which is the version of Atom currently supported by the feedvalidator. As you can see by clicking on the Atom badge above, I now have a valid Atom 0.3 newsfeed.

Jeff Chilton writes in Websphere Power about his adventures porting Roller to Websphere. He tried to take the standalone Roller demo release, which anybody can install in less than 30 seconds, over to Websphere and found - big surprise here - Websphere is a pain in the ass. Want to find out if Roller runs on Websphere? You'll have to wait for part II.

This weekend I'll creating a branch for Roller 1.0 and next week I'll release Roller 1.0 RC1 from that branch.

A number of people have asked for some form of comment authentication in Roller. On blogs.sun.com, John Hoffman added a simple math test. If you want to leave a comment on blogs.sun.com, you have to be able to add. Other users have asked that only registered users be able to leave comments, some have asked for capchas, and some have asked for TypeKey support. To accomodate all of these forms of comment authentication, I introduced an interface called CommentAuthenticator. It looks like this:

import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;
import org.apache.velocity.context.Context;
import org.roller.pojos.CommentData;

public interface CommentAuthenticator
{
    public String getHtml(
                        Context context,
                        HttpServletRequest request, 
                        HttpServletResponse response);

    public boolean authenticate(
                        CommentData comment,
                        HttpServletRequest request);
}

I created a DefaultCommentAuthenticator, which does nothing: getHtml() returns and empty string and authenticate() always returns true. So, by default, Roller does no comment authentication. I also created a MathCommentAuthenticator which, like Hoffman's comment form on blogs.sun.com, asks a simple addition question.

If you want to change the way that Roller does authentication, you implement this interface. In the getHtml() method, you get a Velocity context, a request, and a response. This is your chance to add some HTML to the Roller comment form. For example, in the math authenticator, this is where I put the math question and the HTML <inpuyt> tag for the answer. In the authenticate() method, you get the comment that is to be authenticated and the request, so you can pull out any parameters you have have added the form. For example, I grab the answer to the math question from a request parameter named answer. To enable your new authenticator, put it in the Roller classpath and change the value of the org.roller.commentAuthenticator init parameter in Roller's web.xml.

Several people have asked for comment moderation (as seen on Russell's blog). I'm tracking that request as ROL-492, but it is probably not going to make it into Roller 0.9.9.5.

RED HERRING | Wiki wars: "Fans argue that Wikipedia’s open system taps into the collective wisdom of large groups of people to root out error and minimize bias. While anyone can make a change to any entry, the discussions around those changes are open, said Clay Shirky, an adjunct professor at New York University’s Interactive Telecommunications Program in New York City. “It’s like the security of sidewalks,” said Mr. Shirky. “If everyone shares a little the sidewalk is safe.”"

Wikipedia is just amazing. Given enough eyeballs all bias is evident? I hope that turns out to be true in the long run, but it seems pretty unlikely to me. (Via Dave Winer.)

James Robertson has some good thoughts on wiki vs. blog

Lance comments on the recent surge in referrer spam. I've been deleting referrers and adding ugly new ignore words to my Roller installation on a daily basis this week. It is really getting bad. Three options I would like to see in Roller:

• Referrer white list: a blog only accepts referrers that include words that are listed in the blog's white list.
• MT Blacklist: use the MT Blacklist data to filter referrers just as we now (in Roller 0.9.9) filter comments.
• Technorati check: a blog only accepts comments that come form other blogs that are in the blog's Technorati cosmos.

Eclipse doesn't work very well on Solaris x86, mostly due to the fact it is linked to Motif rather than GNOME. Everything appears to be double spaced and drag and drop don't work at all. I guess I could get the source and rebuild Eclipse against GNOME, but I would rather use my time to get up and running in Netbeans.

Netbeans 4.0b2 looks really good and works well on Solaris x86 (as you might expect). Unfortunately, I ran into a couple of problems while setting up for Roller development in Netbeans. I'm still surfing the mailing list archives and the bug tracker to determine if my problems are caused by known bugs, unknown bugs, or just user error on my part.

• Problem fetching a CVS "sub-module": Roller lives in the Java.Net CVS in /cvr/roller/roller, but I would like to checkout Roller code into ~/src/roller not ~/src/roller/roller. I tried to do this with the Netbeans by turning on the advanced settings and using various combinations of the "Checkout into Folder" and "Do Not Shorten Module Paths" but to no avail. I ended up using command-line CVS to do the trick, some thing like this cvs -d <cvsroot> co -d ~src/roller roller/roller. From there on out I was able to use the Netbeans CVS client on my code to update, commit, diff, etc.
  
  
• Problems importing the Roller build.xml file: Netbeans 4.0b2 has excellent Ant integration, but I had problems making it work with Roller. I tried setting up Roller as a "Web project with an existing Ant script" but when I pointed Netbeans at the Roller Ant file I got "Selected file is not a valid Ant script."

Update:

Turns out, I was able to fix the Roller build script by changing the way in which it brings in it's properties XML file. I changed the third line of the build script from this:

<!ENTITY properties SYSTEM "file:./properties.xmlf">

to this:

<!ENTITY properties SYSTEM "properties.xmlf">

Once I did that, I was able to bring Roller in as a "Java application with an exiting Ant script." I'm subscribed to the Netbeans users mailing list now and I'll direct my future gripes there. And, I'll write up a Roller Development with Netbeans document for the Roller Wiki once I get things sorted out.

I've been working on the Roller user management and login code for over a week now. I just committed a bunch of changes. Here is a summary of my progress in this area:

• HTTPS for login only: Roller can now be configured to force logins to happen over HTTPS, while the rest of the UI remains on HTTP. I did this by using Jon Lipsky's SecureTag from AppFuse to force the login page to HTTPS and then later to force the UI back to HTTP.
  
  
• Editor/Admin UI URL improvements: Editor pages under /editor, admin under /admin. This makes it easier to setup security constraints for editor and admin roles. This was a sweeping change that affected almost all Struts actions in the editor/admin UI.
  
  
• Admin role: admin users are no longer specified in the Roller config, instead they have the admin role. The user-admin page now allows you grant and revoke this role and there is a command-line utility for doing the same.
• Allow admins to create new users: admins can now create new users through the editor/admin UI, even if new user registration is off.
  
  
• Encrypted passwords: Roller can now be configured for encrypted passwords and a utility exists for converting Roller from an unencrypted setup to an encrypted one.
  
  
• Confirmation passwords: all password prompts now ask for password to be entered twice for confirmation.
  
  
• Unit tests with HSQLDB: Added a couple of Ant tasks and so that the Roller build script can start, init, and stop HSQLDB as needed during unit testing. Also added Ant targets so that you can start, init, and stop HSQLDB when you run are running unit tests directly from your IDE.
  
  

Apart from bug fixes the only thing holding Roller 0.9.9.5 back now is comment spam. I need to add some form of comment authentication and introduce some better tools for comment spam removal.

Simon Brown describes how to upload build artefacts to your blog with Ant using the Pebble Ant Tasks. Very cool.

Cory Omand: "For quite some time, I've wanted to publish my large list of bookmarks on the web. The primary reason is to give me a map of information to use when I am not near a browser with my bookmarks. Another reason is to let others benefit from the time I've spent gathering and organizing these links. I could just upload my Netscape bookmarks.html file, as it is just HTML, but there are issues."

Cory shows how to use HTMLTidy, Perl, and XPath to parse his bookmarks.html file, filter out entries from internal corporate domains, and generate stuff. Well, he doesn't actually show how to generate anything yet, but he is ready to generate just about anything. For example, he could generate OPML and then import bookmarks into Roller 0.9.9 (coming soon) for display as I do here. Or, he could write the additional code necessary to check each bookmarked link for an RSS feed, using RSS autodiscovery, and then write the links to those RSS feeds to OPML format for import into his favorite newsfeed reader.

Java.Net powered by Perl? Gotta figure out how to do something about that.