Open host

From eg

An open host is one that reduces the underlying web host relationship to a commodity, so customers can transfer services with an automatic transaction. This reduces the chance of undesired delay, service outage, or being "held hostage" by arbitrary host demands. Such a host meets open configuration standards and is ready for provisioning into a network relying solely on such configuration standards. Note that email is more robust than web in this regard.

Contents 1 impact on service providers 1.1 Flickr vs. Picasa 2 ideology 3 definition

[edit] impact on service providers

Contracts with providers of open host services guarantee that users can more data and service seamlessly and painlessly. A related article at slashdot describes a related google project to let you "take your data and run." This seems to be central to google's strategy. However google lacks IMAP for gmail including tag to folder conversion, nor does Google Docs permit convert to DOC/XLS/ODW/ODS as email.

Portability of real data, such as hosted CRM (e.g. Salesforce) and even mediawiki-based services, can be difficult to achieve. Not least of the concerns are commercial constraints: Google doesn't have much to lose by data portability ... almost all their services are free, vs. Salesforce which has the potential to lose millions per year on some of their larger customes.

[edit] Flickr vs. Picasa

Certain web services seem to be difficult to copy, e.g. Flickr, which has a well regarded API - whatever you can do at Flickr, you can do programatically. Supporting all user interface functions is an API best practice.

Thousands of third party utilities operate over Flickr photos, including many that will download all your photos including metadata. There's even a perl module for it, Net::Flickr::Backup.

Google's Picasa offers similar services with more features and more control built in. It lets you upload photos to an "unlisted" album, which you can then send out special invitation emails out from; only people with the special URL in the email can access the photos. Flickr provides no such method of control; either your photos are public and open to the world, or they're open only to specific Flickr members you designate as 'friends' or 'family.' Basically, if you want to share photos only with your family, Flickr wants you to sign them all up for a Yahoo ID and Flickr itself.

While Flickr and Picasa provide very advanced services, it's not out of the question for these to be provided by open hosts implementing free software someday, making it easy to compete on function.

[edit] ideology

The simplest way to explain this is to say that if you run GNUtella services and SETI@home, you are probably also willing to act as an open host for other stuff if eg:we can only get it to work. Like oh say troll proxy servers, hm ?

When referred to verbally, an open host should always be abbreviated and exclaimed as OH!. As in, "trolls have been using my box to patroll Sourcewatch? OH! I did not know that!"

[edit] definition

• host configuration typically relying on SPML or physical attributes of:
  • box configuration including storage and any Storage Area Networks
  • wire configuration - anything that is wired to the actual box, e.g. routers
  • boot configuration including any reference to any accessible net environments:
  • net configuration including proxy, failover, encryption of shared files
  • root policy or other administrator accounts (in other OS, e.g. DCML configuration of shared data in a NOC environment
• service configuration - set up in service provisioning
  • privacy configuration (includes all information owned by, and changed by, the users)
    • PKI configuration and any user contracts, typically in LegalXML, that make reference to it, any associated ssh configuration
    • DNS configuration including domain registrars and use of any domain shields
    • web configuration including logins and any use of challenge-response, SHTTP, UDDI or related web services
    • wiki configuration mandatory at least to maintain the configuration and failover data, use of standard wiki URIs or interwiki identity standards such as jabber.org identity possibly as a backup to PKI where not adopted
  • boot configuration - set up in server provisioning when boot image is chosen and installed on the box
    • vulnerability
    • compliance
    • patch
  • optional services
    • email configuration
    • eMule configuration if any
    • IRC configuration if any
    • FTP configuration if any

At any given time, a single page establishes who defers to whom on final edits to these. For instance, eg:defer states all these relationships w.r.t. project eg:itself.

The combination of all references to configuration files and all deferences to the sources trusted to provide them, or persons who act as authority on each source, is called an open host configuration.