@kevin @bss @2ck
The way Shareon works for Mastodon is by re-centralizing the entire federated network -- every Mastodon post made via Shareon transits through the developer's site, kytta.dev. Even assuming they are entirely trustworthy and aren't logging everything that passes through, it's kind of obvious that if this tool becomes popular it will utterly collapse under load.
Me: "That's not going to work."
You: "Why so negative?"
Me: "Because facts."
@jwz @kevin @bss @2ck
> assuming they are entirely trustworthy and aren't logging everything that passes through
You can assume that, as the site is open-source. The thing that is being deployed is unmodified: https://toot.kytta.dev/_src
> if this tool becomes popular it will utterly collapse under load
That is somewhat correct. I do encourage others to make their own #Share2Fedi instances, yet I am still to add the support for changing the URL of an instance to #Shareon
> The way Shareon works for Mastodon is by re-centralizing the entire federated network
> That's not going to work
If you have a better idea to make it work, I'm all ears! So far, there are three ways that enables the users to share stuff on Mastodon:
1. Install a browser extension, like Fedishare
2. Use a somewhat centralized share page, like #Share2Fedi
3. Copy URL and post it yourself
IMHO, option 2 is the easiest for the end consumer, even with the bad UX :/
@kytta I thought about it some more, and probably the best option given the available user agents involves the use of a new uri scheme. something like
share:text="Check out this cool book";network=Mastodon,Fediverse
would let Chrome and Firefox, at least, use their "protocol handler" and "Applications" settings, respectively, to take you to your Mastodon or "Fediverse" client to actually share whatever it is. you may still want a browser extension if you want to open the link in a browser, but I would guess you can bridge the gap with a script that parses "share:" URIs then opens on your instance with a prefilled form for posting.
the advantage is that this works better for when you have a separate application already for Mastodon, etc., such as I do on my mobile phone. you can also ignore the "network=" part, since it's just a hint, really, and open any other application you want since the URI doesn't tie you to a specific application's API.
@kytta
of course, I'm not nearly the first to come up with this idea https://github.com/w3c/web-share/blob/main/docs/explainer.md#why-not-make-a-share-uri-scheme-like-mailto-instead-of-a-javascript-api
@kytta there are some issues raised at that link re use of a URI scheme vs a web API. to me, they aren't disqualifying, but I can see some advantages to using the Web Share API. the main downside is just that it requires more standards work and browser buy-in than the URI scheme, the latter of which you could probably do without even talking to the IANA to register the scheme first if you don't want to