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https://github.com/revmischa/grids

Extensible network-based application framework
https://github.com/revmischa/grids

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Extensible network-based application framework

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README 

        
The grids development platform aims to provide a common foundation for

network-based applications. It is designed to be open, cross-platform

and powerful, providing a standard set of protocols defining modern

components of any net-aware application, including cryptography,

redundant client/server architecture, data storage and distributed

communication.



Software can be more than just the sum of its parts, if coherently

organized into a related collection of functionality the result can be

a powerful tool for rapidly creating modern and useful projects. There

are many examples of great features in many varied programs, but it is

rare to find a single application combining more than a few cool

libraries. This is of course due to the fact that few programmers have

the time to learn the ins and outs of key fingerprints and

cryptography, or distributed services, or don't feel like reinventing

the wheel for the nth time.



That being said, we now are fortunate enough to live in an age where

software modularity and re-usability is a mature foundation for

commercial-grade software. One only has to look at CPAN or the Apache

project to find more incredibly useful tools than could ever be

consumed. So many people have already "done the hard work", it's time

that developers and end-users started reaping the rewards. Why should

things like encryption, a robust client-server architecture, platform

agnosticism, or verifiable identity be bonuses or goodies in modern

software?



The main goal of grids is to build a new foundation of network-aware

software and include a new set of assumptions. Just as the invention

of HTML let developers focus more on their content and worry less

about font rendering, widget toolkits and sockets, so should modern

practices be assumed. By default, all data transmitted over the wire

in grids is encrypted with plausible deniability using OTR. Data

structure serialization is incorporated, meaning you never have to

worry about anything but a passing familiarity with deserializing JSON

or Google ProtoBuf. Making your network service distributed among many

machines is not much different from an irc network. Native grids

applications can run on any system with a grids implementation, and

the reference implementation will run on any platform with a perl

interpreter and c compiler. A grids virtual machine is included and

can run grids-native applications in a handy sandbox. It is now the

second decade of the 21st century, if we can't have flying cars it

should at least be possible for lazy programmers to make cool apps.



Grids itself is not a piece of software, it is a collection of

protocols and specifications. Since this project is still in the early

stages there is no formal spec, but one will be forthcoming when all

the requirements and scope of a basic platform are hammered out. For

now the perl libraries posted here are the reference implementation.



If anything here sparks your interest, we would love to have more

people contributing ideas and code. The details of what will be

encompassed are still to be worked out, and we are very interested to

hear what other developers desire. If you're interested please send an

email to a project maintainer.



- Mischa S.