SOCOM Tutorial Slides - Solid

Solid: a decentralized Web ecosystem

• Collection of open Web standards

• Detaches data from application

• Personal data pods → data ownership

The Web as a decentralized platform

• CERN 1989: invention of the Web, Tim Berners-lee

• Information space with uniquely identifiable documents that can be linked.

• Decentralization is complex

• The Web evolves towards centralized applications,
  for example: social networks

The new centralized Web has issues

• Abuse of personal information

  Cambridge Analytica harvesting Facebook profiles without consent

• Information manipulation

  Russian interference in US elections through disinformation on social media

• Censorship

  Facebook removing content and users not conforming to the status quo

Tim Berners-Lee was troubled by this

• He did not like the way the Web was evolving

  As it is becoming increasingly more centralized

• He felt that the Web was in need of major repair

  The Web should go back to its original purpose as decentralized platform

• The Solid project was initiated as a first step to fix it

  By giving users back the control over their data

Inrupt was founded to build on Solid

• A startup founded in 2018

  by Tim Berners-Lee and John Bruce

• Commercial driver behind of Solid

  Development of tools and offering services to enable Solid adoption

Solid gives back control to the user

• Personal data pods

  Data is stored in personal online data storages

• Personal identity

  Users are owners of their own identity through WebID

• Data authorization

  Users can give others fine-grained access to their data

• Data is decoupled from applications

  Applications don't store data, but require permission to data pods

Freedom to locate your data anywhere

• Personal server

  Everyone can set up a Solid server

• Rent data storage

  Guaranteed availability

• Community server

  Limited storage space
  https://inrupt.net/, https://solid.community/

Data pods implement the Linked Data Platform (LDP) specification

Users are in control of their own identity

• Your own WebID

  Identification and authorization with a unique URI

• Log into different places

  Applications require you to log in before they can use your personal data

• You are in control

  Account not in the hands of third-parties such as Google or Facebook

Uses the WebID-OIDC Authentication specification

Fine-grained access control to data

• Each file has a corresponding Access Control List (ACL) file

  Describes who (WebID) has access to the resource, and the modes of access.

• Different modes of access

  Read, write, append, control

• ACLs can inherit from ACLs in parent directories

  Makes it easier to defined scoped access

Uses the Web Access Control (WAC) specification

Data is decoupled from applications

• Applications need to ask for data access

  Access can be revoked at any time

• Reduced vendor lock-in

  Other applications can work with the same data

Inrupt provides Solid tools and services

• Node Solid Server

  A file-system-based Solid server in JavaScript

• Solid Auth Client

  A library to perform authenticated requests to Solid pods

• Solid React SDK

  Components for developing Solid apps in React

• inrupt.net Node Solid Server instance

  A free pod service

Node Solid Server hosts file-based pods

• Reference implementation of Solid

  Implements LDP, WAC, WebID-OIDC, ... specifications

• Single-user or many-user mode

  Host a personal data pod, or service for hosting many data pods

• Optionally hosts WebIDs

  For people without a WebID, a new WebID can be created next to your pod

Open source: https://github.com/solid/node-solid-server
WIP rewrite: https://github.com/inrupt/pod-server

Auth Client for authenticated requests

• JavaScript library for logging into Solid apps

  Implements the WebID-OIDC protocol for clients

• solid.auth.fetch enables authenticated HTTP(S) requests

  solid.auth.fetch has the same interface as fetch

• if (!await solid.auth.currentSession())
    await solid.auth.popupLogin({ popupUri });
  await fetch('https://timbl.com/timbl/Public/friends.ttl');

Open source: https://github.com/solid/solid-auth-client

Solid React SDK for developing Solid apps

• Solid React Application Generator

  Generates a basic Solid app with basic files and dependencies

• Solid React Components Library

  Reusable React components for Solid applications
  login forms, private routes, uploaders, ShEx forms

• Under active development

  New releases biweekly
  WIP: I18N, user preferences, Linked Data Notifications, data discovery, ...

SDK overview: https://github.com/inrupt/solid-react-sdk

inrupt.net for easily creating a Solid pod

• Public Node Solid Server instance

  Everyone can register for a pod and WebID

• Storage quota of 25MB

  To avoid abuse of this public service

Summary

• Solid aims to re-decentralize the Web

  Decouples data from applications

• Solid is not a tool, but an ecosystem

  A collection of open Web standards (LDP, WebID-OIDC, WAC, ...)

• Inrupt is a commercial driver behind Solid

  Develops Node Solid Server, Solid React SDK, ...