Fediverse link-aggregator PieFed launches in beta test

Asudox , 5 months ago

and uses Python.

Great. Can’t wait to see how slow it is.

Five , 5 months ago

Fediverse links to current communities:

• !piefed_meta
• !piefed_help

fenndev , 5 months ago

Always happy to see a new Fediverse service!

My only concern is Python. Wonderful for AI and scripting, but I’m not sure how well it works as a web server. Although, I’d assume that a lot of the web server code is actually C under the hood…

rimu , 5 months ago

PieFed dev here.

It'll be interesting to see how Python performs.

There's some fun stuff you can do with compiling Python into C. e.g. https://cython.org/ or https://docs.exaloop.io/codon/. But I don't see a need for it as PieFed doesn't really crunch numbers much. Mastodon has a Ruby backend. Kbin uses PHP. Until you get really massive the choice of language doesn't really make a huge difference to performance as most of the work in most web apps is done by the database.

I am a little bit concerned about the limited support for asynchronous I/O in the Flask framework, which could limit scalability at some point. But there are options for the future. Quart claims to be a drop-in replacement for Flask.

In any case, performance is just one factor. For a FOSS project to be successful long term it needs contributions from other developers and with the massive pool of Python developers there are, hopefully I'll be getting some help soon. Also along those lines I have deliberately chosen:

• to code as simply and stupidly as possible, to make it accessible to most skill levels.
• No complicated frameworks, fancy algorithms, or esoteric design patterns. Model View Controller, baby.
• No frontend build process or tool chain (vanilla JS only. No npm).
• Few third party dependencies, only Redis and Postgresql. Mostly.

All this makes setting up an initial development environment, finding the bit you want to change and testing it out fairly quick and easy.

I hope it's these choices that lead to an absolute blizzard of contributions from many people and that's where the true strength of the project will come from.

Spzi , 5 months ago

In any case, performance is just one factor. For a FOSS project to be successful long term it needs contributions from other developers and with the massive pool of Python developers there are, hopefully I’ll be getting some help soon. Also along those lines I have deliberately chosen:

<span style="color:#323232;">to code as simply and stupidly as possible, to make it accessible to most skill levels.
</span><span style="color:#323232;">No complicated frameworks, fancy algorithms, or esoteric design patterns. Model View Controller, baby.
</span><span style="color:#323232;">No frontend build process or tool chain (vanilla JS only. No npm).
</span><span style="color:#323232;">Few third party dependencies, only Redis and Postgresql. Mostly.
</span>

All this makes setting up an initial development environment, finding the bit you want to change and testing it out fairly quick and easy.

Sounds very wise to make it as accessible as possible. And you basically get super maintainable code as a side product!

MajorHavoc , 5 months ago

adding a warning on posts made by accounts with low reputation, meaning that their posts get downvoted a lot.

Sounds very nice.

kariboka , 5 months ago

A good option for beehaw

rimu , 5 months ago

I am very inspired by Beehaw and what they're trying to do. I'm building quite opinionated software with my values baked into it and those seem like a good fit for Beehaw. But I don't know any of the people involved so I'd be arriving very late to the party without any knowledge of the terrain or history. Best to stay out of it.

I just want to code, ban nazis, do linux admin and build community infrastructure. :)

kariboka , 5 months ago

we can tag them here to let them know :)

@Lionir @alyaza @admin

xepher , 5 months ago

Hello from the beta instance!

kariboka , 5 months ago

Hey there!

nickwitha_k , 5 months ago

Welcome!

onlinepersona , 5 months ago

I have honestly not found flask + (probably) sqlalchemy to be the easiest thing out there. Just like mailinglists: simple doesn’t mean easy. Many people conflate the two.

rimu , 5 months ago

One of the good/bad things about Flask is it's quite a small framework which lets the developer do whatever they want (yay!) so it's easy to make an unholy mess (boo!). I hope that I've stayed on the rails with PieFed.

It's a bit sad what has happened in the most recent version of SQLAlchemy - they made it all weird and difficult. PieFed uses an older version which I find very intuitive and simple.

swab148 , 5 months ago

Looks like it’s too late to sign up, I just tried and it kept telling me to “verify that [I’m] not a robot” without giving me anything (like a captcha) to do so.

Atelopus-zeteki , 5 months ago

I signed up, no problem. There is a bit of funky behavior (I clicked on the Pie logo, and it changed to the word, "Logo" haha), but overall it looks sharp. I"m trying to figure out where to make suggestions - I'm a dark screen person, and it's got way too much white and blue - colors that suppress melatonin production. I'm mighty fond o' me melatonin.

rimu , 5 months ago

Dark mode has been added!

Atelopus-zeteki , 5 months ago (edited 5 months ago)

Yay, and thank YOU!!
Edit: I went over and looked. So the point of dark mode is to make things easy on the eyes, and to reduce interference with melatonin production. Melatonin production is blocked by blue and white (because it contains blue) light. The best option for dark mode is black background and orange type, as it provides good contrast with minimal interference with melatonin production.

The classic example is the White / Blue of Facebook - designed, no doubt to keep users awake, and clicking. I noticed sometime ago, that screen invert in iOS yields, White --> Black, and Blue --> Orange. Technically speaking any light will reduce melatonin production to some degree, some researchers would say, even being able to see your hand in front of your face, like at all, will do it. And the biggest effect is from Blue and White light. :-)

rimu , 5 months ago

No blue, got it.

Currently, dark mode is just whatever Bootstrap considers ideal dark mode to be so there's a lot of room for improvement. PieFed includes a theming framework which will make it quick and easy to build custom themes so I expect many more design options will be available in the future.

nix , 5 months ago

Awesome!

P.S. Is it just me or does join.piefed.social have no link to actually join or go to piefed.social? Also what software does the blog use i can’t find it listed

rimu , 5 months ago

There are links to piefed.socal but I guess a nice big button front and center on the home page is what it needs.

The blog is Wordpress with the Activitypub plugin. It can be followed on Mastodon/kbin: @piefedadmin

rimu , 5 months ago

PieFed dev here.

Sorry about that, I've had a hard time getting the captcha working while also having decent XSS protection. I've deployed a probable fix, please try again.

Atelopus-zeteki , 5 months ago

The REAL MVP!!! Yay Rimu!!!

Nougat , 5 months ago

More options is better.

willya , 5 months ago

Fast, clean, and right to the point. Looks like good company.

simple , 5 months ago

Official site is here: join.piefed.social

Beta test is happening here: piefed.social

It looks quite neat. I like the emphasis on making things easy for admins and using more tried and true technology compared to Lemmy’s bleeding-edge (that sometimes causes issues). Here’s hoping it’ll be a great alternative to Lemmy.

scytale , 5 months ago

Nice! I hope it gets popular enough to get the same multitude of desktop front-ends and mobile apps Lemmy now has.

flamingos , 5 months ago

Maybe they can implement Lemmy’s API, like what Misskey et al. does with Mastodon’s API, so it can use the same apps.

ShittyKopper , 5 months ago

FYI misskey does not implement the masto api. some software like pleroma/akkoma, gotosocial and yes, a few misskey forks do (in various states of brokenness, with iceshrimp being the most compliant one) but misskey itself does not.