Glossary

Some of the common terms used in Google Wave

Wave (Google Wave)

This is the complete, continuous conversation (to call it a conversation, is over simplification) . I really mean -

A Wave is a Wave is a Wave , – Whatever we may call it.  A Wave by any other name will still be a Wave.

Similar to the famous phrase – A Rose is a Rose is a Rose.

Wavelet (Google Wavelet)

A Wavelet is a sub-wave, rather branched off thread of a complete wave. It can involve fewer participants or even same number of participants

Blip (Google Wave Blip)

Blip is one sentence – the smaller unit or building block of a wave. It’s equivalent to one statement by a participant.

Gadgets / Widgets

Programs embedded in a wave. Maps, Surveys / Polls, Games etc

Robots

Auto responder like entities. They behave like participants and emit blips with useful information. Respond to participants actions, fetch useful information, perhaps (as I understand) gathering RSS update?

(P.S. These definitions are based on my understanding of Google Wave so far. Feel free to correct me, if needed)

Part – 1 My Understanding of Google Wave – Part 1

Brief analysis of Google Wave from the view point of a user. What it is, What it means to us, How to use it and so on. Possible use cases. Recently (read a few weeks ago) I got a confirmation mail from Google that my Google Account has been approved for Google Wave. I could not wait and jumped to try and see for myself what this much talked about tool is all about.

Initially, I was presented with somewhat familiar interface – like email (but its not really email) and a few waves. I was also presented with a wave to offer invitations to my friends and contacts. I could somewhat feel the difference but not really well. The trials were deferred for a few weeks due to my other commitments and it was later that I had explored the documents for Google Wave and resumed the trials. Here I share my own understanding of a Wave.

Google Wave, as I think is some kind of mix of an Email, Chat, Forum Thread, Remarks, Sharing of document (or embedding of Documents) HTML widgets, (Google Widgets) Sharing Maps, Games etc. There are certain differentiating and innovating features.

Google Wave is NOT Email

A Google Wave is NOT an email. For Email you have a client or web based client and mail servers. We are all familiar with Email and therefore no more elaborations there. Google wave has to be checked / monitored / participated by logging into the client (web based, of course. May be other clients are there too using the API) . In Google wave there are no recipients, rather there are participants.

Google Wave is NOT just Chat

Google Wave is not a simple chat conversation.  There is no chat session, opposed to chat it continues. Also it is recorded (The wave itself is manifestation of recording)

Google Wave is NOT just Forum

Similarly, it’s not just another forum thread. Yes, it closely resembles a forum discussion – albeit it has a lot of other additional goodies. Read on.

Google Wave is Conversation and Events

Yes, it is like forum discussions, but participants can join and unjoin. Replay is possible which permits a time varying visualization of happenings. For example, a wavelet can  have a Game in which participants can make moves (events)

Google Wave is About One person, Two persons and also Multiple Persons

A Google wave may have one or more people. I as a user can create a wave with he/she being the sole participants.  It can have a two persons – like a private chat. Which is continuously recorded over a period of time. Not just this, it can have multiple participants. Any participant can join (when originator adds him) at any point – Even after wave has started. Participants also can unfollow a wave and thereby unjoin.

Google Wave is Happening

Wave is a sort of happening. People may join the wave, leave the wave (unfollow) . In that sense – it’s like a continuous  (open ended) journey. Things happen in due course of time.

Google Wave is Real Time

Google wave happenings take place in real time. It’s just like meeting people in course of a journey or real meet over a period of time. There is no end – as it seems. Can we stop a wave? I do not have answer now, but the time will tell. If this feature is not there, it might be suggested and implemented sometime.

Google Wave is Asynchronous and Synchronous

Primarily Google Wave happenings are Asynchronous. Events take place as a result of some action by participants. These events are asynchronous. The entire process is real time. The results are recorded in real time.

Events Display Non Linearly

In terms of time, the display is non linear. It simply means that it is not necessary that a remark which is made or a reply to a blip is always appended. Remarks can be applied to past events even though there may be other events after that. It will show up in context of the event to which it was replied., not necessarily at the bottom.

Google Wave can be Played

In order to see the exact order of events, there is a mechanism of events to be replayed. This will show the events in successive frames as they happened over time.

Google Wave is Sharing and Collaborating

Google wave is about sharing. Users can share documents, links and objects. There are a number of Google widgets which can be shared by embedding. Games can be shared. Maps can be shared. Real time tours can be shared.. in that sense, it looks like to perform functions of twitter as well.

Google Waves are Threaded

Google Wavelets are displayed in a threaded view. Most of us are familiar and not much needed to explain it.

Embedding in Google Waves

This is really cool. Users can embed objects as has been mentioned above. This makes the wave more powerful. Objects can be many things, pictures, audio, pages, maps, games, clocks etc. Usually, it’s a code, which in turn means it’s a program, which  eventually means it executes and thereby can respond to participants’ behaviors and can theoretically function like a full fledged programs.

Google Waves have Access Rights

There are access limitations. Participants can have access rights to add content to wave or simply read. This is yet not mature and not much granular access control is there. Hope Google will do that too, provided there is a sufficient demand by users.

I shall continue this in future posts…

Part 2 -My Understanding of Google Wave – Part 2

P.S. This is a new tool. Not all features have yet been tested by me. It is quite possible that once I do more extensive trials with Google Wave, I might change my opinion. You can also point me to the right direction, wherever applicable.

This morning, when I logged on to check my mails, I was pleasently surprised by a little red message in Gmail top bar!

Guess what it was? Yeah, right! Gmail / Gchat  is now armoured with Video

May be now, I will have reason to hook up a camera and meet the contacts tete-e-tete!

I have not yet downloaded, but it requires you to have a plugin and that’s it.

Is that plugin available for Linux too ? Yet to explore.

Trick to use Apache Directive AllowOverride in SMEserver. This enables using .htaccess and thereby modifying web server configuration.

Sometimes, it is desired to use Apache directives to configure the web server for a specific domain. For example, I needed to use Rewrite engine and mod_rewrite. This was to be done on a SME Server using .htaccess file in the web root directory for that domain. This would have been possible if AllowOverride directive of Apache would have been set to All (to enble me use .htaccess)
The Problem was although the Mod Rewrite was loaded into global Apache configuration, it was not possible because by default, the Apache was configured to Not Allow Overrides.

Upon detailed inspection of config files of SME Server, I found a very simple way which was also in line with the elegent configuration mechanism of SME Server.

For example, we need to use Apache Overrides for a domain, which is mapped to an ibay called “ibay1″,

Step 1. Set a new property in smeserver configuration

smeserver database : accounts
key name: ibay1
property to be used: AllowOverride
value to be set: All

SME server has a nice mechanism of configuration. (refer to docs for details). At the moment, we are interested in the configuration database (of smeserver philosphy) named accounts (this holds the properties for all ibays) . The property of our interest is called “AllowOverRide” in smeserver lingo. This is *not set*by default. However, smeserver does consider, if the property is present. We just need to set it properly. This can be set by simple command

db accounts setprop ibay1 AllowOverride All

Our first and critical step is done.

Step 2. Regenerating Configuration and other files

The property setting has still not taken effect. For this, a complex and consistive chain of actions are to be done, like saving this value in database, regenerating whichever config files are necessary for system integrity, (esp. regenerate or expand the templates) for /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf (apache configuration file). Furtunately, SME server also has decent mechanism and all this is done in a single shot. Just give the command

signal-event ibay-modify ibay1

The ibay1 will now enable Apache AllowOverride to All and this in turn would enable us configure the Apache web server *just* for this ibay1 to use the .htaccess files to change configuration, as needed.

Note: This assumes default smeserver set up with version 7.3

How to use SME server for virtual web hosting. Setting up ibays and mapping domains to ibays

This is not a complete document, rather simple trick and tip. This may be updated as needed. It describes how to host virtual web site using SMEserver

We assume, that DNS for this domain is already set up. If not this may be done in SME Server itself or elsewhere. Same is true of Emails.

Reference: SME Server V 7.2 / 7.3
(May work with earlier versions – Not tested)

Example domain mydomain.com

1. Create a user

Create a user, for example names u1, and group g1 (also make, user u1 a member of group g1. remember, users, groups, ibays are though different entities, yet they can not have same names, i.e. they share same namespace in smeserver)

2. Create Ibay

Create an Ibay, – for example ibay1 (Keep in mind restriction on Ibay name – 12 Characters) . Settings are as follows

• Group – g1
• User access via file sharing or user ftp – Write=group, Read=everyone (Read=group may also work)
• Public access via web or anonymous ftp – Entire Internet (no passwor required)
• Execution of dynamic content (CGI, PHP, SSI) – Enabled

3. Create a Domain

Go to menu in left side bar for domain and add a domain with following settings

Name – mydomain.com

• Brief description – Description for this site (free format)
• Content – ibay1 (this is important, select the desired ibay, previously created Ibay, in step 2, above will appear in the drop downlist, this needs to be selected)
• Domain DNS Servers – Select “Internet DNS Servers”

Save it and you are ready to go.

Files Location:

HTML Directory (Web Root)

Absolute path: /home/e-smith/files/ibays/ibay1/html
Relative URL : / or /ibay1

CGI-Bin directory for Executables

Absolute Path: /home/e-smith/files/ibays/ibay1/cgi-bin
Relative URL : /cgi-bin/ or /ibay1/cgi-bin

Extra File Directory also in web server accesible space:

Absolute Path: /home/e-smith/files/ibays/ibay1/files
Relative URL : /ibay1/files OR /files

Just put some HTML, PHP and simlar files and see your site in the browser!

Note: This uses default set up of PHP (viz PHP4), Perl, Apache etc.

PHP is a most sought after web scripting language. On the other hand SME server by contribs.org is a wonderful linux distribution encompassing, security, mail and other services. However, present version smeserver 7.2 and smeserver 7.3 are prepackaged with php 4. Sometimes, its needed to use php5. More so, because PHP community has stopped support for PHP5 after 2007. If SME server is to be used for web applications, deployment of PHP5 is needed for many applications.

Following how to from firewall services have suggested a simple and decent way to deploy PHP5 (some issues still there)

Getting PHP5 binaries

PHP5 binaries. It is these binaries which are important and that is the trick as well. Here it is suggested to use PHP5 as CGI executable. Ok, so here are the method and sources

mkdir php5-cgi
cd php5-cgi
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-imap-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-ldap-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-mysql-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-pear-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm
wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-xmlrpc-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rpm

It is to be noted here that PHP5, which is referred to here is CGI and another important aspect is that the version is PHP 5.1.2-1 . I did try to search for later version, but I did not find. I shall see if later versions are available and if so, update the link here

Optionally ODBC module (perhaps not needed mostly) is also there

wget http://sme.firewall-services.com/downloads/php5-cgi/php5-cgi-odbc-5.1.2-1.sp.i386.rp

Installation of PHP5-CGI

This is just simple

yum localinstall ./*.rpm

Enabling PHP5-CGI selectively

This part is multi-step and a bit complex. We need to do Custom Template for httpd.conf modification

We need to modify httpd.conf file so that php5 can be used for .php files. It is **important** to remember that we want to enable php5-cgi for some applications only and not througout the server and therefore it is need to twek the httpd.conf file to use php5-cgi *just* for designated directories.

Now, the decent way of sme server templating. We just make our ouw template and later expand it to generate httpd.conf of our liking.

Create a directory for httpd.conf template

mkdir -p /etc/e-smith/templates-custom/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf/

(Note that this step will be here. In original article it is mentioned at second stage)

Create a new template – Step 1

vim /etc/e-smith/templates-custom/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf/80php5-cgi

with following entries

ScriptAlias /php5-cgi /usr/bin/php5
<Directory /usr/bin/php5>
       order deny,allow
       deny from all
       allow from all
       Options ExecCGI
</Directory>

Create a new template – Step 2

Configuring *selective* applications to be taken care by php5-cgi
We create a custom template for each webapp which need php5. For example, if we have installed in an ibay called ’myapp’, we shall create the file 90myapp or rather we can also create file named 90AddPHP52myapp

vim /etc/e-smith/templates-custom/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf/90myapp

Entries to go in this file

<Directory /home/e-smith/files/ibays/myapp/html>
       AddHandler php5-cgi .php
       Action php5-cgi /php5-cgi/php
</Directory>

Create a new template – Step 3

Regenerate new httpd.conf by expanding the above template

expand-template /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Testing configuration file for syntax

httpd -t

Restart the web server

svc -t /service/httpd-e-smith

With this, the myapp ibay files will be executed by php5-cgi and rest will be handled by default installation of php4

Important

For these apps the php.ini file will be in /etc/php5

Original Article Ref: http://sme.firewall-services.com/spip.php?article46

smeserver is a fantastic server package on linux platform. Smeserver 7.2 is based on CentOS 4.6. Using mysql for user databases is not possible by default and some tricks are needed.

MySQL on contrib.org ’s smeserver

Here are some notes from http://wiki.contribs.org/MySQLThis is not a verbatim copy, rather there may be modifications, as I used these for my own use

Reference:

Installed version of sme server 7.2

MySQL as installed by default on smeserver (ver 7.2 , 7.3)

• Uses Socket (to be used from localhost) and networking is off
• Does not require password for root user, if you give command ‘mysql mysql’ from shell prompt, you are automatically logged as root with highest privileges. This only works when logged in the shell
• There is no Mysql administrative interface

Steps to use MySQL on smeserver

A. Configure MySQL to use networking.

By default, on smeserver it is configured to use sockets, rather than ports. This is to access database *only* from local network. For remote access see section, D

(This is modified as mentioned on the wiki page referred to above. I have tried this and found to be working, whereas the method given in the wiki does not work )

cd /var/service/mysqld
sv d .
config setprop mysqld LocalNetworkingOnly no
expand-template /etc/my.cnf
sv u .

Method for above as given in wiki

config setprop mysqld LocalNetworkingOnly no
expand-template /etc/my.cnf
/etc/rc.d/init.d/mysqld restart

This causes system to hang and MySQL does not restart gracefully.

B. Create database

mysqladmin create <dbname>

C. Create User and also add hosts for this user/db combination

mysql_setpermission is an interactive, text based utility for user and user, database, host management

mysql_setpermission

use above interactive program to (a) create user, (b) add access rights to user, database and host combinations.