@movq@www.uninformativ.de

Maybe I’m being a bit too purist/minimalistic here. As I said before (in one of the 1372739 posts on this topic – or maybe I didn’t even send that twt, I don’t remember 😅), I never really liked hashes to begin with. They aren’t super hard to implement but they are kind of against the beauty of the original twtxt – because you need special client support for them. It’s not something that you could write manually in your twtxt.txt file. With @sorenpeter@darch.dk’s proposal, though, that would be possible.

Tangentially related, I was a bit disappointed to learn that the twt subject extension is now never used except with hashes. Manually-written subjects sounded so beautifully ad-hoc and organic as a way to disambiguate replies. Maybe I’ll try it some time just for fun.

@bender@twtxt.net Now that I’m thinking about it, I could just add in a cron job on my remote machine with: twtxt2html https://domain.ltd/twtxt.txt > /path/to/static_files_dir/ that way I could benefit from the ‘relative time’ portion I’m getting rid of with the -n …

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com I just added support for passing a custom template file via -T/--template in case you need a custom template 👌

prologic@JamessMacStudio
Wed Sep 18 01:27:29
~/Projects/yarnsocial/twtxt2html
 (main) 130
$ ./twtxt2html --help
Usage: twtxt2html [options] FILE|URL

twtxt2html converts a twtxt feed to a static HTML page
  -d, --debug             enable debug logging
  -l, --limit int         limit number ot twts (default all) (default -1)
  -n, --noreldate         do now show twt relative dates
  -r, --reverse           reverse the order of twts (oldest first)
  -T, --template string   path to template file
  -t, --title string      title of generated page (default "Twtxt Feed")
  -v, --version           display version information
pflag: help requested

@prologic@twtxt.net I’d be glad to! I’m just taking time to get well acquainted with it’s ins and out before saying something stupid 😅 Like… I’ve just noticed the -n 🫠

@quark@ferengi.one At the moment, the twt in question exists in the sixth archive:

$ jenny -D https://twtxt.net/user/prologic/twtxt.txt/6 | head
[o6dsrga] [2020-07-18 12:39:52+00:00] [Hello World! 😊]

Does that work for you? 🤔

@prologic@twtxt.net

() @falsifian@www.falsifian.org You mean the idea of being able to inline # url = changes in your feed?

Yes, that one. But @lyse@lyse.isobeef.org pointed out suffers a compatibility issue, since currently the first listed url is used for hashing, not the last. Unless your feed is in reverse chronological order. Heh, I guess another metadata field could indicate which version to use.

Or maybe url changes could somehow be combined with the archive feeds extension? Could the url metadata field be local to each archive file, so that to switch to a new url all you need to do is archive everything you’ve got and start a new file at the new url?

I don’t think it’s that likely my feed url will change.

@prologic@twtxt.net Yeah, that thing with (#hash;#originalHash) would also work.

Maybe I’m being a bit too purist/minimalistic here. As I said before (in one of the 1372739 posts on this topic – or maybe I didn’t even send that twt, I don’t remember 😅), I never really liked hashes to begin with. They aren’t super hard to implement but they are kind of against the beauty of the original twtxt – because you need special client support for them. It’s not something that you could write manually in your twtxt.txt file. With @sorenpeter@darch.dk’s proposal, though, that would be possible.

I don’t know … maybe it’s just me. 🥴

I’m also being a bit selfish, to be honest: Implementing (#hash;#originalHash) in jenny for editing your own feed would not be a no-brainer. (Editing is already kind of unsupported, actually.) It wouldn’t be a problem to implement it for fetching other people’s feeds, though.

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com Btw, I’m also open to ideas for this tool and welcome any contributions 👌

@bender@twtxt.net It’s just a simple twtxt2html and scp … it goes like:

twtxt2html $HOME/path/to/local_twtxt_dir/twtxt.txt > $HOME/path/to/local_twtxt_dir/log.html && \
scp $HOME/path/to/local_twtxt_dir/log.html user@remotehost:/path/to/static_files_dir/

I’ve been lazy to add it to my publish_command script, now I can just copy/pasta from the twt 😅

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I did the same. jenny fetches archives, yes, but that twtxt I am referring about is no longer. If you fetch it, but I don’t, there is certainly something going on…

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I did started from scratch, today. I using am commit 6e8ce5afdabd5eac22eae4275407b3bd2a167daf (HEAD -> main, origin/main, origin/HEAD), I keep myself up-to-date, LOL. Still, that specific twtxt (o6dsrga) is no longer.

@quark@ferengi.one

Since jenny can’t fetch archived twtxts

I wiped my entire maildir and re-fetched everything. I did that recently because @aelaraji@aelaraji.com asked me to 😅, but I guess I also did this back in 2023.

What did you do to make yours work?

jenny does fetch archived feeds during the normal jenny -f operation. Only when using the recently implemented --fetch-context, archived feeds are not fetched (yet). That was an oversight and I intend to fix that.

@sorenpeter@darch.dk It’s nobody’s fault! 😇 It’s all part of the fun with them Ones and Zeros

After re-fetching feeds, the earliest twtxt I have from you is n7gavoa.

@prologic@twtxt.net, your first twtxt ever was o6dsrga, but I can’t find the source for it (the raw file). I reset everything, and re-fetched fresh feeds (allegedly including archives). Where is it?

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I figured it will be something like this, yet, you were able to reply just fine, and I wasn’t. Looking at your twtxt.txt I see this line:

2024-09-16T17:37:14+00:00	(#o6dsrga) @<prologic https://twtxt.net/user/prologic/twtxt.txt>

@<quark https://ferengi.one/twtxt.txt> This is what I get. 🤔

Which is using the right hash. Mine, on the other hand, when I replied to the original, old style message (Message-Id: <o6dsrga>), looks like this:

2024-09-16T16:42:27+00:00	(#o) @<prologic https://twtxt.net/user/prologic/twtxt.txt> this was your first twtxt. Cool! :-P

What did you do to make yours work? I simply went to the oldest @prologic@twtxt.net’s entry on my Maildir, and replied to it (jenny set the reply-to hash to #o, even though the Message-Id is o6dsrga). Since jenny can’t fetch archived twtxts, how could I go to re-fetch everything? And, most importantly, would re-fetching fix the Message-Id:?

@prologic@twtxt.net you will always be replying to OP - that is what the twthash is a shorthand for, it it not?!

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I’m glad you like it. A mention (@<movq https://www.uninformativ.de/twtxt.txt>) is also long, but we live with it anyway. In a way a replyto: is just a mention of a twt instead of a feed/person. Maybe we chould even model the syntax for replies on mentions: (#<2024-09-17T08:39:18Z https://www.eksempel.dk/twtxt.txt>) ?!

@mckinley@twtxt.net Yes, changing domains is be a problem if you tie your identity to an https url. But I also worry about being stuck with a key I can’t rotate. Whatever gets used, it would be nice to be able to rotate identities. I like @lyse@lyse.isobeef.org’s idea for that.

Thank you @movq@www.uninformativ.de Things are working again!! 🙏

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I’d guess the same goes for all twtxt.social feeds… I can’t see bender’s archived twts either, didn’t check for the others.

This is how my original message shows up on jenny:

From: quark <quark>
Subject: (#o) @prologic this was your first twtxt. Cool! :-P
Date: Mon, 16 Sep 2024 12:42:27 -0400
Message-Id: <k7imvia@twtxt>
X-twtxt-feed-url: https://ferengi.one/twtxt.txt

(#o) @<prologic https://twtxt.net/user/prologic/twtxt.txt> this was your first twtxt. Cool! :-P

Hmm… I replied to this message:

From: prologic <prologic>
Subject: Hello World! 😊
Date: Sat, 18 Jul 2020 08:39:52 -0400
Message-Id: <o6dsrga>
X-twtxt-feed-url: https://twtxt.net/user/prologic/twtxt.txt

Hello World! 😊

And see how the hash shows… Is it because that hash isn’t longer used?

@prologic@twtxt.net this was your first twtxt. Cool! :-P

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I wiped both ~/.cache/jenny and my maildir_target when I tried to reset things. Still got wrecked 😅

If it’s not too much to ask, could you backup or/change your maildir_target and give it a try with an empty directory?

@prologic@twtxt.net

PS: I still can’t get your and bender’s archived twts (at least the ones I’ve noticed), nor can I --fetch-context on replays to them. your oldest is the one from 2024-06-14 18:22 … I can see lyse’s tho! but I doubt this is related the edit issue but this helps with something.

@prologic@twtxt.net I can’t pinpoint the exact cause but here are a couple of symptoms I observed:

• It all started with a LOT of his old twts starting back in 2020 showing in a weird way, some were empty others were duplicates and a lot more got marked for deletion by neomutt with the D tag.
  
• After trying to restart things with a fresh Maildir, I couldn’t fetch a lot of twts, even mine which was a replay to one of his. but then I was able to after temporarily deleting his link from my follow file.
  

then @quark@ferengi.one and @bender@twtxt.net pointed out the inconsistent from: + feed url and the twt edit

@movq@www.uninformativ.de we can shorten it by six characters, with (r:https://...). 😅

@sorenpeter@darch.dk

1. (replyto:http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)
   

I think I like this a lot. 🤔

The problem with using hashes always was that they’re “one-directional”: You can construct a hash from URL + timestamp + twt, but you cannot do the inverse. When I see “, I have no idea what that could possibly refer to.

But of course something like (replyto:http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z) has all the information you need. This could simplify twt/feed discovery quite a bit, couldn’t it? 🤔 That thing that I just implemented – jenny asking some Yarn pod for some twt hash – would not be necessary anymore. Clients could easily and automatically fetch complete threads instead of requiring the user to follow all relevant feeds.

Only using the timestamp to identify a twt also solves the edit problem.

It even is better for non-Yarn clients, because you now don’t have to read, understand, and implement a “twt hash specification” before you can reply to someone.

The only problem, really, is that (replyto:http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z) is so long. Clients would have to try harder to hide this. 😅

@prologic@twtxt.net I am going to light some candles this weekend to “La Virgen de Macarena” to make it happen! :-D

@prologic@twtxt.net you need to catch up with my twtxts, mate. :-P

@quark@ferengi.one We will fix this soon™ 🔜

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com So what is it about @sorenpeter@darch.dk’s feed that’s screwed with your client? (Jenny?) 🤔 Kind of curious now 🤣

@prologic@twtxt.net by the way and just in case… is the metadata in tour twtxt.txt file, pointing at your rotated feed files formatted as prev = hash twtxt.txt/n instead of a link by design? I couldn’t fetch any, nor can I do a –fetch-context on replays to your old twts.

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com grats! See how much trouble an edited twtxt can cause? Wish there was a simpler solution. Alas, I don’t have much hope.

FIX: Temporarily removed sorenpeter’s twtxt link from my follow list, whipped my twtxt Maildir and jenny Cache. Only then I was able to fetch everything as usual (I think). Now I’ll backup things and see what happens if I pull sorenpeter’s feed.

No keyboards were harmed during this experiment… yet.

Image

@prologic@twtxt.net Nah! I don’t do news feeds 🤣 I gave some a try back then but it was just way too much noise. I have a separate app for RSS feeds I want to follow. None of them mention AI except for one article about the author’s fight back against the crawlers, I believe I’ve mentioned it before.

The wiered thing is Twtxt fetches everything just fine (I think) except for not having the convenience of having replays grouped into threads.

@movq@www.uninformativ.de I can have more than one Yarn, correct? Like:

"yarn_pods_for_discovery": ["https://twtxt.net", "https://txt.sour.is"],

I mean, this: https://darch.dk/timeline/replies?url=http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com make sense, probably. The twtxt was already on my Maildir, that’s why I can fetch it. I fetch every 3 minutes (sssh, don’t tell anyone!). LOL!

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com check “Replies”. :-D

@bender@twtxt.net I can’t see ANY of those LOL not even a broken thread. The whole Thread went Poof!! as if it has never happened …

@quark@ferengi.one No can do! I can’t see any of the replies to that thread, not even mine LOL. let me se if I can fetch @sorenpeter@darch.dk ’s feed with the https link.

More:

Subject: The [tag URI scheme](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_URI_scheme) looks interesting. I like that it human read- and writable. And since we already got the timestamp in the twtxt.txt it would be
        somewhat trivial to parse. But there are still the issue with what the name/id should be... Maybe it doesn't have to bee that stick? Instead of using `tag:` as the prefix/protocol, it would more it clear
        what we are talking about by using `in-reply-to:` (https://indieweb.org/in-reply-to) or `replyto:` similar to `mailto:` 1. `(reply:sorenpeter@darch.dk,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)' 2.
        `(in-reply-to:darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)' 2. `(replyto:http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)' I know it's longer that 7-11 characters, but it's self-explaining when looking at the
        twtxt.txt in the raw, and the cases above can all be caught with this regex: `\([\w-]*reply[\w-]*\:` Is this something that would work?

Subject: The [tag URI scheme](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_URI_scheme) looks interesting. I like that it human read- and writable. And since we already got the timestamp in the twtxt.txt it would be
        somewhat trivial to parse. But there are still the issue with what the name/id should be... Maybe it doesn't have to bee that stick? Instead of using `tag:` as the prefix/protocol, it would more it clear
        what we are talking about by using `in-reply-to:` (https://indieweb.org/in-reply-to) or `replyto:` similar to `mailto:` 1. `(reply:sorenpeter@darch.dk,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)` 2.
        `(in-reply-to:darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)` 3. `(replyto:http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt,2024-09-15T12:06:27Z)` I know it's longer that 7-11 characters, but it's self-explaining when looking at the
        twtxt.txt in the raw, and the cases above can all be caught with this regex: `\([\w-]*reply[\w-]*\:` Is this something that would work?

Notice the difference? Soren edited, and broke everything.

See:

Message-Id: <hns535a@twtxt>
X-twtxt-feed-url: https://darch.dk/twtxt.txt
In-Reply-To: <pvju5cq@twtxt>

And

Message-Id: <weadxga@twtxt>
X-twtxt-feed-url: http://darch.dk/twtxt.txt
In-Reply-To: <pvju5cq@twtxt>

Two feed URLs, one HTTPS, the other HTTP.

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com no, it is not just you. Do fetch the parent with jenny, and you will see there are two messages with different hash. Soren did something funky, for sure.

@quark@ferengi.one here is an example: This Thread is not showing up in Mutt 🤔 Something is off!

I’ll set up jenny and mutt on another computer and see how it goes from there.

@aelaraji@aelaraji.com hmm, I see all of your twtxts just fine. Now, that’s a puzzle!