[Savannah-hackers] savannah.gnu.org: submission of Linjabb IsNotJustAnotherBulletinBoard

[gnu]

A package was submitted to savannah.gnu.org.
This mail was sent to address@hidden, address@hidden


Richard Smith <address@hidden> described the package as follows:
License: gpl
Other License: 
Package: Linjabb IsNotJustAnotherBulletinBoard
System name: linjabb
This package does NOT want to apply for inclusion in the GNU project

Description:
Linjabb is a secure, multimodal discussion system. These terms are defined as 
follows.

Linjabb enables users on a computer network to participate in threaded 
discussions. A discussion is a set of text messages, with a relation defined on 
some members of the set to indicate one message is a reply to another message. 
A message, together with all its replies, and all their replies, etc., is 
called a `thread\'. Threads are organised into \"forums\" according to topic. 
Threaded forum discussions are commonly seen on usenet, mailing lists, and web 
message boards. Linjabb integrates with and replaces all these forms of 
discussion.

Linjabb supports multiple modes of communication. Furthermore, it has a plugin 
architecture to enable users to add additional modes of communication. A 
`mode\' of communication consists of any application-layer protocol which can 
send and receive text data. It does not matter if the protocol is real-time or 
not. For example, Linjabb is supplied with a plugin to support email. This 
enables any email client that supports the  standard to participate in a 
discussion, thus implementing the functionality of a traditional mailing list. 
A real-time instant message plugin (using the Jabber protocol) is planned. It 
would be possible to create a plugin to support any protocol, such as FTP, but 
since FTP was not designed for online discussion, this would not make sense. 
More sensible plugins would be IRC (real-time) and usenet (non real-time). 
Since Linjabb is a Free Software project, it is hoped that users will create 
plugins that can then be included in the standard distribution.

Linjabb is a secure system, even when run on an insecure network (such as the 
Internet). Security has many aspects. Messages should only be sent and received 
by users who have permission to do so. It should be possible to verify the 
authenticity of any message, while maintaining the anonymity of the poster (if 
anonymity is desired by the poster and allowed by the administrator). It should 
not be possible for a user to repudiate a posted message. If not everyone has 
permission to read a discussion, then secrecy must be maintained when sending 
and receiving messages.

The security policy must be implemented by all plugins, but the method used to 
implement it is left up to the plugin author. For instance, the web interface 
uses Secure-HTTP and passwords for security. This would not make sense for the 
email plugin, which uses OpenPGP encryption and signatures. The security policy 
must also be flexible. Some discussions will require strict security controls, 
while for others this they be an unnecessary hassle (such as for most 
\"public\" discussions).

Linjabb version 1.0 was written as my Computer Science final project, but has 
not yet been released.

Other Software Required:
Java
Cryptix OpenPGP
JavaMail
Jakarta Tomcat

Other Comments:
I have not tested using a free Java implementation.  In theory it should work 
(it is entirely command-line, no Swing or AWT), but I no longer have time to 
develop the project.  Rather than let it rot, I would like to release it as 
free software.