OpenSocial: Difference between revisions

The OpenSocial Foundation has integrated or supported various [[Open Web]] technologies, including [[OAuth]] and [[OAuth 2.0]], [[Activity Streams (format)|Activity Streams]], and [[Portable Contacts]]. Since its inception on November 1, 2007,<ref>{{Cite web|title = Google Launches OpenSocial to Spread Social Applications Across the Web – News announcements – News from Google – Google|url = http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2007/11/google-launches-opensocial-to-spread_01.html|website = googlepress.blogspot.com|access-date = November 23, 2015}}</ref> applications that implement the OpenSocial APIs can [[interoperability|interoperate]] with any social network system that supports them.

OpenSocial was rumored to be part of a larger social networking initiative by Google code-named "Maka-Maka",<ref name="Makamaka">{{cite web |url=https://techcrunch.com/2007/10/29/googles-response-to-facebook-maka-maka/ |title=Google's Response to Facebook: "Maka-Maka" |access-date=October 31, 2007 |last=Schonfeld |first=Erick |date=October 29, 2007 |work=[[TechCrunch]] }}</ref> <ref>{{Cite news |last=Sloane |first=Julie |title=Will Google's "Maka-Maka" Turn the Web Into a Social Network? |url=https://www.wired.com/2007/10/will-googles-ma/ |access-date=2024-05-20 |work=Wired |language=en-US |issn=1059-1028}}</ref>which is defined as meaning an "intimate friend with whom one is onin terms of receiving and giving freely" in [[Hawaiian language|Hawaiian]].<ref name="makamaka meaning">{{cite web|url=http://www.wehewehe.org/gsdl2.5/cgi-bin/hdict?d=D12283|title=maka.maka|access-date=November 1, 2007|work=Nā Puke Wehewehe ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi|publisher=Ulukau: The Hawaiian Electronic Library|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130918182810/http://www.wehewehe.org/gsdl2.5/cgi%2Dbin/hdict?d%3DD12283|archive-date=September 18, 2013|url-status=dead}}</ref>

An [[open-source software|open-source]] project, [[Shindig (software)|Shindig]], was launched in December 2007 to provide a [[reference implementation]] of the OpenSocial standards. It has the support of Google, Ning, and other companies developing OpenSocial-related software. The Myspace OpenSocial parser was released as project Negroni in January 2011 and provides a [[C Sharp (programming language)|C#]]--based implementation of OpenSocial.

Apache Rave is a lightweight and open-standards-based extensible platform for using, integrating, and hosting OpenSocial and W3C Widget -related features, technologies, and services. It will also provide strong context-aware personalization, collaboration, and content integration capabilities and a high -quality out-of-the-box installation as well as be easy to integrate ininto other platforms and solutions.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.w3.org/blog/2014/12/opensocial-foundation-moves-standards-work-to-w3c-social-web-activity/#Container_Information |title=Open Social Foundation Moves Standards Work to W3C Social Web Activity | access-date=December 2, 2015}}</ref>

[[hi5]] taps [[Widgetbox]]'s support for OpenSocial to get access to the choice of web widgets Widgetbox provides.<ref>{{Cite web|title = "hi5 Taps Widgetbox for OpenSocial Support and Access to the World's Widest Selection of Widgets." Science Letter 9 Sept. 2008: 4265. Academic OneFile. Web.|url = http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%257CA185000528&v=2.1&it=r&p=&sw=w&asid=12ff4338141eb7d8148c8a27147041a0|website = go.galegroup.com|access-date = September 9, 2015}}</ref>

Initial OpenSocial support experienced vulnerabilities in security, with a self-described amateur developer demonstrating [[exploit (computer security)|exploits]] of the [[RockYou]] gadget on [[Plaxo]], and of [[Ning (website)|Ning]] social networks using the [[iLike]] gadget.<ref name="theharmonyguy">{{cite web |url=https://techcrunch.com/2007/11/05/opensocial-hacked-again |title=OpenSocial Hacked Again |access-date=November 6, 2007 |last=Arrington |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Arrington |date=November 5, 2007 |publisher=[[TechCrunch]] }}</ref> As reported by [[TechCrunch]] on November 5, 2007, OpenSocial was quickly cracked. The total time to crack the OpenSocial-based iLike on Ning was just 20 minutes, with the attacker being able to add and remove songs on a user's playlist and access the user's friend information.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://techcrunch.com/2007/11/05/opensocial-hacked-again/ |title=OpenSocial Hacked Again |access-date=July 24, 2010 |last=Arrington |first=Michael |date=November 5, 2007 |work=[[TechCrunch]] }}</ref>

Häsel and Iacono showed that “OpenSocial specificationspecifications were far from being comprehensive in respect to security”.<ref>{{Cite book|title = Security in OpenSocial-Instrumented Social Networking Services|publisher = Springer Berlin Heidelberg|date = May 31, 2010|isbn = 978-3-642-13240-7|pages = 40–52|series = Lecture Notes in Computer Science|doi = 10.1007/978-3-642-13241-4_5|first1 = Matthias|last1 = Häsel|first2 = Luigi Lo|last2 = Iacono|editor-first = Bart De|editor-last = Decker|editor-first2 = Ingrid|editor-last2 = Schaumüller-Bichl}}</ref> They discussed different security implications in the context of OpenSocial. They introduced possible vulnerabilities in Message Integrity and Authentication, Message Confidentiality, and Identity Management and Access Control.

OpenedDespite tothe muchinitial fanfare in& news coverage, OpenSocial didencountered notmany workissues well in the beginninginitially; it only ran on the Google-owned [[Orkut]], and only with a limited number of gadgetsdevices, returningwith multiple errors forreported on other gadgetsdevices. Other networks were still looking into implementing the framework.

On December 6, [[TechCrunch]] followed up with a report by MediaPops founder Russ Whitman, who said, "While we[they] were initially very excited, we[they] have learned the hard way just how limited the release truly is." Russ added that "core functionality components" are missing and that "write once, distribute broadly" was not accurate.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://techcrunch.com/2007/12/06/opensocial-still-not-open-for-business/ |title=OpenSocial Still "Not Open for Business" |access-date=July 24, 2010 |last=Schonfeld |first=Erick |date=December 6, 2007 |work=[[TechCrunch]] }}</ref>

Changes to the [[REST API]] were made to address several issues that required changes in the OpenSocial specifications so it could be used by the [[Open Mobile Alliance]] could use it..<ref name="OS251" />

OpenSocial introduced support for [[Activity Streams]]. JSON had emerged as the preferred data format and support for [[Atom (web standard)|ATOM]] was deprecated. The Gadget format was simplified to give the ability to define a template library within a Gadget specification.<ref name="OS200" /> While not finalized, the groundwork for OAuth 2.0 support was put in place.

OpenSocial acknowledged that the "one-size-fits-all" approach it was taking was not going to work for the diverse typetypes of websites that had adopted the platform. To address this issue, OpenSocial is modularized into four compliance modules: Core API Server, Core Gadget Server, Social API Server, and Social Gadget Server.<ref name="OS100" /> This allowed a developer to pick and choose the modules they wanted to use while using other services that aren't part of OpenSocial. Extensions were introduced to allow developers to extend OpenSocial containers.

In response to feedback and observation of how developers were using the API, this version focused on making "application development, testing, and deployment easier and faster, while reducing the learning curve for new app developers."<ref name="OS090" /> The OpenSocial Javascript API was streamlined to make it lightweight while retaining the power of the old Javascript API. Proxied content was introduced to eliminate the need for developers to work around previous [[Ajax (programming)|AJAX]] limitations. Proxied content allows a content to be fetched from a URL and displayed in a <Content> tag. In response to a common use of sending data to a remote server immediately after a request, OpenSocial 0.9.0 introduced data pipelining. Data pipelining allows the developer to specify the social data the application will need and make the data immediately available. OpenSocial Templates were introduced to create data-driven UI with a separation of markup and programmatic logic. OpenSocial Markup Language (OSML Markup) is a new set of standardized tags to accomplish common tasks or safely perform normally unsafe operations within templates. OSML is extensible. Developers can create a library of their own custom tags.

This minor release placed a major focus on server-to-server protocols as "the Person schema has been aligned with the Portable Contacts effort, and an optional RPC proposal has been added."<ref name="OS081" /> [[JSON-RPC]] protocol was added to increase server -to -server functionality. The RESTful protocol that was introduced in v0.8.0 underwent a large revision with several fields being added, modified, and deleted.

OpenSocial changed specifications for containers to implement a [[RESTful API]]. Many of the OpenSocial Javascript API changes made this version incompatible with previous versions. Existing gadgets continued to use v0.7.0. After updating the gadget, it would use v0.8.0. Security improved with the introduction of OAuth authorization and [[HTML]] sanitation, and container lifecycle events.<ref name="OS080" /> Persistence data was stored in [[JSON]].

Released as the "first iteration that can fully support rich, social applications."<ref name="OS070" /> It added several standard fields for profile information, the ability to send a message to install an application, an Activity template to control activity notifications about what users have been doing, and a simplified persistence API to use feeds instead of global and instance-scoped application data. Another major announcement came from [[Apache Shindig]]. Apache Shindig -made gadgets are open -sourced. In coordination with this announcement, OpenSocial 0.7.0 introduced Gadget Specifications for developers to be able to define their gadgets using the Gadget API.

Google announced the launch of OpenSocial with a pre-release of version 0.5.0. While unstable, this API introduced "various XML DTDs, [[JavaScript|Javascript]] interfaces and other data structures"<ref name="OS050" /> to the OpenSocial platform.