A talk that I gave at foss.my 2009 about the new web based sync available in Tomboy 1.0 and the accompanying sync server component Snowy.

1. Tomboy WebSync Explained
25 Oct 2009 foss.my 2009
Mohanaraj Gopala Krishnan
mohangk@gmail.com

2. We take FOSS
seriously in Malaysia

3. Questions for you?
• Use Tomboy or any other application for note taking ?
• More then one machine ?
• Keep notes in sync ?
• Built a GUI app that speaks to web service ?
• Does OAuth authentication ?
• Synchronises data into the cloud ?
• Use some for of hosted application ? (webmail, fileshare, notes/todo, pics etc. ?)
• Concern about/Considered your freedoms?
• Data portability ?

4. Not your grandma’s notepad
• Actively developed - 5 years , released 1.0 on
21st of Sept 2009
• Wiki - links
• Notebooks - group notes
• Search
• Background save
• Formatting
• Add-in system
• Really cool developers - sandy, brad etc
• Active community - IRC, mailing list
• Built on Mono
• Ports : Conboy (https://garage.maemo.org/projects/conboy/), Gnote
(http://live.gnome.org/Gnote), Tomdroid (https://launchpad.net/tomdroid)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sparktography/64946647/

5. Platform support
• Mac
• Windows
• Linux
• Android - alpha
• Maemo

7. Add-in ecosystem
• Extensive add-in
collection
• Blogposting
• Latex
• Bugzilla
• Evolution
• Many more - http://live.gnome.org/
Tomboy/PluginList

8. Add-in development
• Built on Mono.Addins
framework
• Different type of Add-Ins
• Note add-in
• Application add-in
• Sync add-in
http://www.halloweencostumeideas.com/adult-plug-socket-costume.html

9. Getting Tomboy 1.0
• Mac, Windows, Src -http://
projects.gnome.org/tomboy/download.html
• Ubuntu - https://launchpad.net/
~tomboy-packagers/+archive/stable
• SUSE (one click)- data:text/x-suse-
ymu,http://armstrong-clan.net/dump/
tomboy.ymp
• Fedora, Centos,
Slackware, etc ? - Build
instructions - http://live.gnome.org/Tomboy/
Developers

10. Synchronisation of notes
• Local file sync + external
transfer (gvfs, sshfs etc)
• WebDAV
• Tomboy WebSync
http://www.flickr.com/photos/eugene/186980377/

11. Tomboy WebSync
• Communicates over
HTTP to keep the
server and the Tomboy
client in sync
• Browser sends and
receives data from
websites
• Tomboy sends and
receives data from
Snowy - JSON

12. Tomboy WebSync
• Client server HTTP based protocol
with JSON representation for data and
metadata
• Benefits from HTTP- compression,
caching, authentication etc.
• Client implemented as add-in in Tomboy
1.0
• Server implementations
• Snowy
• Midgard CMS
• Ubuntu ONE

13. Ubuntu One
• Canonicals cloud
offering
• Notes - via Tomboy
• Files
• Free - up to 2GB, 50GB
USD10 a month
• https://one.ubuntu.com/

14. Snowy
• Python - Django based
• django-piston, django-
revision
• Multi user
• Actively under
development
• AGPL

15. Getting Snowy
• URL - http://
live.gnome.org/Snowy
• git clone git://
git.gnome.org/snowy
• Install dependencies,
python related, django
• Run using django server
or install on apache via
WSGI - http://
live.gnome.org/Snowy/
WSGI

16. DEMO
(I hope its not fscked) http://icanhascheezburger.com/2007/03/12/is-it-safe/

17. Sync steps
• Introspection
• Authorisation
• Data
synchronisation
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mar00ned/188634413/

18. Introspection
Allows for the
client to determine
information about
the server
http://icanhascheezburger.com/2009/01/04/funny-pictures-is-where-da-rubs-gok/

19. Introspection
http://tomboysync/api/1.0/
http://tomboysync/api/1.0/user

20. Authorisation
Allows for the
server to ensure
that the client is
authorised to
access the data
http://icanhascheezburger.com/2009/10/24/funny-pictures-you-can-trust-me/

21. Authorisation - OAuth
• Uses OAuth
• Allows secure
connection
without needing to
store usernames
and password -
stores access
token
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=4468563

22. Synchronisation
• Subversion - like
• There is a running version number for the notes on the server
• Local copy of notes are like working directory
• When sync starts Tomboy requests changes since the latest version in its
local repository
• Download changes - apply against local copy (svn up)
• Uploads local changes (svn commit)

23. Handling conflicts
• Happens when there
are local changes to a
note that has also
been changed on the
server or a different
client
• Determined client
side
• Overwrite or rename http://icanhascheezburger.com/2007/08/21/mow-mow-mow-me-mow-mow/

24. AGPL - Why bother?
"It's stupidity. It's worse
than stupidity: it's a
marketing hype campaign,"
"It's just as bad as
using a
proprietary
program. .... If you use a
proprietary program or
somebody else's web server,
you're
defenseless..."
RMS - http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/ http://geekz.co.uk/lovesraymond/archive/stallmans-tarball
2008/sep/29/cloud.computing.richard.stallman

25. AGPL - Why bother?
• GPL -modify, and
study,
freedom to
redistribute source code
- only to recipients of
the program
• AGPLof these freedoms
scope
- broadens the
to those who use the
application over
the internet

26. Summary