#announcement

hq@pod.diaspora.software

diaspora* version 0.9.0.0 released!

We generally don't give nicknames to our releases, but if we did, this would be called "The Confusing Release". We know that some of you were expecting us to release Version 0.8, while others were eagerly awaiting Version 1.0 - and you've got neither! And there wasn't even a Release Candidate or any other announcement! Please allow us to explain ourselves.

As some of you know, we always work on two versions at the same time. One, that we call a "minor version", is the kind you see us releasing quite frequently. Minor versions include security updates, bugfixes, and some smaller feature additions. We design those versions in a way that allows pod administrators to install them as fast as possible, without manual changes or long downtimes. On the other hand, there are "major versions", that are... well, major. These contain big features, large breaking changes, stuff like that. We keep these seperate as we want to make the lives of our podmins as easy as possible, and major upgrades always require manual interventions or longer downtimes, so we want to keep them as rare as we can.

Our last major release, diaspora* 0.7, was released almost seven years ago - in August 2017. That is quite a long time! And ever since, we have kept working on two versions in parallel: the next "minor", and the next "major". This development model is quite common in big projects, and it's fine, until it's not.

Since the release of 0.7, the difference between the latest minor version and the work-in-progress major versions has become enormous: more than 20,000 lines of code added, and over 6,000 lines removed. For reference, that means that almost 15% of our entire codebase has changed. This huge divergence means that releasing new minor versions has become more and more complicated, as we always have to apply any changes to both work-in-progress versions, and it has reached a level where it's causing us lots of pain and making it harder to release any updates.

Additionally, our community of developers has built quite a few amazing new features for "the next big version". Some of you on pods that run the "development" code already get to use them, but a very large chunk of our userbase does not. That's a shame, because some of the things we have already built are a big deal!

At the same time, we have really ambitious plans for Version 1.0, and as much as we'd love to get it out there, we simply aren't done yet.

This is why we're now release a intermediate major release. We're calling it Version 0.9 because, while it's more than simply the next major version upgrade, it isn't quite Version 1.0 yet. Even so, there's still a really good list of stuff in this version, and we're really excited to get it out to you. And now, enough waffling, let's get to the details.

The Release

Since the last major release, Version 0.7.0.0, a total of 50 contributors have commited 1,833 commits. This includes 858 from 20 contributors that have never been included in any release up until now! A few highlights:

  • diaspora* now has an API! If that term means nothing to you: it allows software developers to build applications on top of diaspora* in an easy and reliable way. You want to build a fully-fledged mobile phone app? API. A script that automatically posts your comics to your diaspora* profile? API. You want to display your diaspora* posts on your website? API. You want to build a text-only user interface for your command line? API. If this sounds interesting to you, check out our API documentation, and let us know if you build something cool!
  • Having an API also means that everyone can use Insporation, a mobile app available for Android and iOS. It's still under development, but if you want, give it a try by following the instructions here, you might like it!
  • Likes on comments have returned!
  • Have you ever taken a profile picture that was slightly off? From now on, you can crop your profile picture before you upload it.
  • Are you tired of the "file is too big" erorr when trying to post a large photo? Well, so are we. We now automatically resize your image uploads in case they're too big for us, so you don't have to take care of that.
  • Speaking about image uploads ... you can now copy-paste images into the diaspora* editor! And the progress bar when uploading multiple photos is no longer broken.
  • The mobile version has got a few improvements as well. For example, you can now select multiple aspects! Exciting, we know. :)
  • Bugfixes! Quite a few of them! Too many of them to list here, and let's be honest, listing bug fixes is quite boring anyway.

The full ChangeLog is available here For podmins, there are quite a few breaking changes. Please make sure to read the upgrade instructions in our wiki, and plan in some time for long database migrations to run!

Thank YOU!

While diaspora* is moving slower than projects with full-time, paid engineering teams, we are incredibly proud of our community and our work. A huge thank you goes out to all the people contributing to this project, entirely in their spare time.

It doesn't matter if you're writing code, helping with documentation or translations, or if you're just using diaspora* to post cute cat photos. We love all of you, and we're happy you're with us. <3


#diaspora #announcement #release #0900 #surprise

team@pod.geraspora.de

Pardon, wir hatten ein kleines, eh, Infrastrukturproblem, das dazu geführt hat, dass die Federation von und zu anderen Pods ein bisschen kaputt ist. Das Problem ist behoben, aber wir haben nun über 5500 Jobs in der Warteschleife, die sich jetzt erstmal langsam abarbeiten müssen. In ner Stunde oder so is dann alles wieder gut.


Due to an acute misalignment of the stars causing a spike in electromagnetic radiation that upset our servers, we had some issues processing Federation tasks in the last 16'ish hours. We fixed that, but there's more than 5500 background jobs in the queue waiting for their turn, so please give our poor servers an hour or so to catch up. Sorry for that!


#geraspora #announcement #maintenance

kurt@opensocial.at

FreeCAD :freecad: - 2024-04-29 17:31:18 GMT

Vote for a new FreeCAD logo
There have been 46 submissions to the new FreeCAD logo contest. The user poll is closing on May 1 (this Wednesday). You can still pick your top 5 entries. The 5 winning submissions will then be submitted to the maintainers team for the final voting.
https://blog.freecad.org/2024/04/29/vote-for-a-new-freecad-logo/
#Announcement

anonymiss@despora.de

#Microsoft offers legal #protection for #AI #copyright infringement challenges

Source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/09/microsoft-offers-legal-protection-for-ai-copyright-infringement-challenges/

Microsoft's #announcement comes as generative AI tools like #ChatGPT have raised concerns about reproducing copyrighted material without proper attribution. Microsoft has heavily invested in AI through products like #GitHub #Copilot and #Bing Chat that can generate original code, text, and images on demand. Its AI models have gained these capabilities by scraping publicly available data off of the #Internet without seeking express #permission from copyright holders.

Now we know what #PirateBay made wrong:

They were not a multi million startup with a global company as a sponsor. So what they did was #piracy. But if #ChatGPT copies the whole internet it's a business model.

#news #law #business #economy #politics #copy

team@pod.geraspora.de

Ahoy! Nur eine kurze Ankündigung: Zum Ende des Jahres werden wir mit den monatlich wechselnden Tiermotiven im Header aufhören. Uns sind die Motive ausgegangen, und der Aufwand steht inzwischen nicht mehr wirklich in Relation zum anscheinenden Interesse hier. Die Dia-Infoseite werden wir dann in eine Archiv-Seite umwandeln, die Möglichkeit, sich ein eigenes Dia auszusuchen, entfällt damit auch im Januar.


Hi there, short announcement time: as this year comes to an end, we'll no longer have monthly switching animals in our header. We kinda ran out of good source material, and it's been a while since anyone showed significant interest here, so the effort isn't really worth it. The infopage will turn into a static archive, which means the ability to select a custom Dia will also be gone in January.


#geraspora #announcement

dapor2000@pod.dapor.net

#podmin #diaspora #dapor #announcement

Viele dürften es schon mitbekommen haben:

pod.dapor.net wird zum 13.12.2023 eingestellt

Gründe dafür gibt es viele, aber kurz zusammengefasst:

  • Zeitmangel
  • berufliche Anforderungen (Ü2-Überprüfung)
  • Anpassung meiner persönlichen Hobbies

Ich danke allen, die den Pod genutzt haben.

@Gerhard Hallstein Ich habe den Termin eingeplant

anonymiss@despora.de

Redditors #prank #AI - powered #news mill with “Glorbo” in World of #Warcraft

source: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/07/redditors-prank-ai-powered-news-mill-with-glorbo-in-world-of-warcraft/

On Thursday, a Reddit user named kaefer_kriegerin posted a #fake #announcement on the World of Warcraft subreddit about the introduction of "Glorbo" to the game. #Glorbo isn't real, but the post successfully exposed a #website that scrapes Reddit for news in an automated fashion with little human oversight.

#fakenews #technology #journalism #press #web #game #gmaer #manipulation #fail #wtf #omg