------
Laconica 0.8.0 ("Shiny Happy People")
-8 July 2009
+15 July 2009
This is the README file for Laconica, the Open Source microblogging
platform. It includes installation instructions, descriptions of
as default TOS for Laconica sites.
- Better command-line handling for scripts, including standard options
and ability to set hostname and path from the command line.
+- An experimental plugin to use Meteor (http://www.meteorserver.org/)
+ for "real-time" updates.
+- A new framework for "real-time" updates, making it easier to develop
+ plugins for different browser-based update modes.
+- RSS 2.0 and Atom feeds for groups.
+- RSS 2.0 and Atom feeds for tags.
+- Attachments can be sent by email.
+- Attachments are encoded as enclosures in RSS 2.0 and Atom.
+- Notices with attachments display in Facebook as media inline.
+
- Many, many bug fixes.
Prerequisites
The following software packages are *required* for this software to
run correctly.
-- PHP 5.2.x. It may be possible to run this software on earlier
+- PHP 5.2.3+. It may be possible to run this software on earlier
versions of PHP, but many of the functions used are only available
in PHP 5.2 or above.
- MySQL 5.x. The Laconica database is stored, by default, in a MySQL
that user's default group instead. As a last resort, you can create
a new group like "mublog" and add the Web server's user to the group.
-4. You should also take this moment to make your avatar subdirectory
- writeable by the Web server. An insecure way to do this is:
+4. You should also take this moment to make your avatar, background, and
+ file subdirectories writeable by the Web server. An insecure way to do
+ this is:
chmod a+w /var/www/mublog/avatar
+ chmod a+w /var/www/mublog/background
+ chmod a+w /var/www/mublog/file
- You can also make the avatar directory writeable by the Web server
- group, as noted above.
+ You can also make the avatar, background, and file directories
+ writeable by the Web server group, as noted above.
5. Create a database to hold your microblog data. Something like this
should work:
shorturllength: Length of URL at which URLs in a message exceeding 140
characters will be sent to the user's chosen
shortening service.
-design: a default design (colors and background) for the site.
- Sub-items are: backgroundcolor, contentcolor, sidebarcolor,
- textcolor, linkcolor, backgroundimage, disposition.
dupelimit: minimum time allowed for one person to say the same thing
twice. Default 60s. Anything lower is considered a user
or UI error.
+textlimit: default max size for texts in the site. Defaults to 140.
+ 0 means no limit. Can be fine-tuned for notices, messages,
+ profile bios and group descriptions.
db
--
The site will reject any notices by these users -- they will
not be accepted at all. (Compare with blacklisted users above,
whose posts just won't show up in the public stream.)
+biolimit: max character length of bio; 0 means no limit; null means to use
+ the site text limit default.
newuser
-------
maxaliases: maximum number of aliases a group can have. Default 3. Set
to 0 or less to prevent aliases in a group.
+desclimit: maximum number of characters to allow in group descriptions.
+ null (default) means to use the site-wide text limits. 0
+ means no limit.
oohembed
--------
notify: an array of URLs for ping endpoints. Default is the empty
array (no notification).
+design
+------
+
+Default design (colors and background) for the site. Actual appearance
+depends on the theme. Null values mean to use the theme defaults.
+
+backgroundcolor: Hex color of the site background.
+contentcolor: Hex color of the content area background.
+sidebarcolor: Hex color of the sidebar background.
+textcolor: Hex color of all non-link text.
+linkcolor: Hex color of all links.
+backgroundimage: Image to use for the background.
+disposition: Flags for whether or not to tile the background image.
+
+notice
+------
+
+Configuration options specific to notices.
+
+contentlimit: max length of the plain-text content of a notice.
+ Default is null, meaning to use the site-wide text limit.
+ 0 means no limit.
+
+message
+-------
+
+Configuration options specific to messages.
+
+contentlimit: max length of the plain-text content of a message.
+ Default is null, meaning to use the site-wide text limit.
+ 0 means no limit.
+
+Plugins
+=======
+
+Beginning with the 0.7.x branch, Laconica has supported a simple but
+powerful plugin architecture. Important events in the code are named,
+like 'StartNoticeSave', and other software can register interest
+in those events. When the events happen, the other software is called
+and has a choice of accepting or rejecting the events.
+
+In the simplest case, you can add a function to config.php and use the
+Event::addHandler() function to hook an event:
+
+ function AddGoogleLink($action)
+ {
+ $action->menuItem('http://www.google.com/', _('Google'), _('Search engine'));
+ return true;
+ }
+
+ Event::addHandler('EndPrimaryNav', 'AddGoogleLink');
+
+This adds a menu item to the end of the main navigation menu. You can
+see the list of existing events, and parameters that handlers must
+implement, in EVENTS.txt.
+
+The Plugin class in lib/plugin.php makes it easier to write more
+complex plugins. Sub-classes can just create methods named
+'onEventName', where 'EventName' is the name of the event (case
+matters!). These methods will be automatically registered as event
+handlers by the Plugin constructor (which you must call from your own
+class's constructor).
+
+Several example plugins are included in the plugins/ directory. You
+can enable a plugin with the following line in config.php:
+
+ addPlugin('Example', array('param1' => 'value1',
+ 'param2' => 'value2'));
+
+This will look for and load files named 'ExamplePlugin.php' or
+'Example/ExamplePlugin.php' either in the plugins/ directory (for
+plugins that ship with Laconica) or in the local/ directory (for
+plugins you write yourself or that you get from somewhere else) or
+local/plugins/.
+
+Plugins are documented in their own directories.
+
Troubleshooting
===============
* Brenda Wallace
* Jeffery To
* Federico Marani
+* Craig Andrews
Thanks also to the developers of our upstream library code and to the
thousands of people who have tried out Identi.ca, installed Laconi.ca,