Author: AnuV

Sharable Plugin System for qaul.net – Midterm Updates

Posted on by AnuV

Hi everyone, 

As we are on the midterm evaluation process, I would like to share what I have done so far. I created a small HTML5 application to share the location of a user, it uses geolocation API for this purpose. This will work online but, if we are offline it will work only if the device had a browser which communicated directly with the GPS hardware. This is how the application looks like when the location is found out:

As per my plan I was supposed to create a JSON API the application can use to send the request to the web server of qaul.net and a new message type for all the plugins in general. But it is not yet completed, so I have created a button in the message page of qaul.net GUI which will invoke the Javascript function to get the location of the user and it will be sent using the existing message type. There’s more work to be done for the proper working of the plugin mechanism in the qaul.net. Currently the location of the user is sent as longitude and latitude manner in the messaging system as shown below.

Cheers,

Anu

Sharable Plugin System for qaul.net

Posted on by AnuV

Hi everyone,

I’m Anu Vazhayil, exchange student at University of Paderborn from India. I am one of the Google Summer of Code participant for the project qaul.net. 

Qaul.net is a mesh network communication app which can be run in Linux, OSX, Windows and Android. It can be used to send text messages, file sharing and even make voice calls with people who are connected to this network without being connected to internet or cellular networks. There is also a feature to share your internet with the other users connected to the qaul.net network. All this makes it a cool app which everyone will feel to try atleast onceWink.  If you have not installed it in your system, you can still connect to the network via web interface after connecting to a wifi.

As part of the GSoC project, we are planning to extend the usability of the messaging system of qaul.net. The messaging system can be used as a communication layer for other purposes like location sharing, sending contacts etc. Such apps/extensions can be downloaded by the user as a zipped file which will automatically get downloaded to the web plugin directory available to the web server. It also proposes an additional feature to share the installed plugins with other users in the network over file sharing.

The following needs to be implemented for the project:

  • Plugin API: to describe the features of a library and how to interact with it. It defines a mechanism to use the messaging system for plugins and give it access to the qaul.net topology.
  • Plugin structure: a zipped folder with a special extension that can be shared with other users in the network over file sharing.
  • Plugin management function: Installation and plugin sharing. Once the Plugin is installed, it is copied and extracted to a directory in the web server.
  • Sample Plugin: Share the location details of the user. It will have access to the user’s location through the API implemented.
Mockup UI
Stay tuned for my next blog posts with the updates regarding my projectLaughing. I will also update my blog: https://captanu.wordpress.com/ in the coming days. Our coding period starts today so, I wish All the best to other GSoC students too. Happy coding everyone!
Cheers!