OpenPaaS Newsletter 12 - February 2018
Introduction
That’s it, winter is well settled. Get cozy, and let our February edition warm your heart a bit. Today we seize the opportunity to introduce you Hubl.in and CryptPad. These two web applications are currently being integrated into OpenPaaS, our awesome Platform as a Service. Let’s discover them together ;)
What is Hubl.in?
Hubl.in is the awesome videoconferencing software we have been contributing to as a stand-alone solution and is now being integrated into OpenPaaS. First an independent system, Hubl.in has walked its own path before joining the great OpenPaaS family. So what are the news?
Previously we have shared with you the progress we made when it comes to scalability. Hubl.in in its early version bet on a full P2P topology. Unfortunately, this has proven difficult to scale as the number of streams quickly reached the limit over which the conference was no longer efficient.
From P2P to using a gateway
That is why, in the case of integrating Hubl.in into a platform such as OpenPaaS, we have decided to rely on Janus, a WebRTC gateway already used by Slack or the IETF. While it means abandoning the full P2P topology we once wanted, we will reach the level of service you can expect of any good video-conferencing software: up to ten attendees, current limit of most well known conferencing products (please note: the P2P version will remain available). On top of that, the videoconference can be used on desktops and laptops but also on Android tablets and smartphones either over WiFi or 4G networks.
Hubl.in’s integration into OpenPaaS
To achieve this and integrate Hubl.in as the center of the OpenPaaS smart videoconferencing system, the team has reached 6 people working enthusiastically on the project. Both code branches have been merged into one to improve the maintainability of both topologies, with a connector allowing to use either one and the other. This allows to keep the previous P2P system working and maintainable in parallel with the Janus integrated code. Both systems shall live together as it may prove useful for various future use cases.
The test server is now set up and the final settings are being tuned.
Next step will be a greater integration in OpenPaaS, taking Hubl.in’s interoperability with the other modules features one step further.
What is CryptPad?
CryptPad is a collection of web-based open source office tools featuring end-to-end encryption (E2EE) and real-time collaboration among peers (contributions welcome). End-to-end encryption ensures that only the people actually working on an online pad can read it: neither the server where the file is stored nor the internet service provider can decrypt it. On the encryption side of things, the project is relying on scrypt, a password-based key derivation function algorithm designed to be more robust against application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and other custom-hardware attacks.
How CryptPad has been integrated into OpenPaaS?
On one hand, OpenPaaS doesn’t feature E2EE but can be paired with a webSSO such as LemonLDAP. On the other hand, CryptPad is a standalone application without any directory service. How can they join forces?
Modularity is the answer
OpenPaaS is extensible and has been designed as such from the get go, most notably through the use of modules. Both teams at OpenPaaS and CryptPad have been working together to ensure that the integration would go well. As of now, there is a beta version of OpenPaaS which features CryptPad as a module, sharing the same directory service used by OpenPaaS. Soon enough, this feature will roll into production.
Collaboration as a win-win situation
As a result of this collaboration, the CryptPad team added some customization capabilities to their own product. For Linagora and XWiki (the team behind CryptPad) it has been a win-win situation!
Conclusion
Now, you know a little bit more about Hubl.in and CryptPad as apps and also their current place inside our open source platform.
In our March newsletter, you will follow the new adventures of the James team and discover the behind the scenes of LinShare’s integration inside OpenPaaS.
Keep in touch with OpenPaaS on Twitter, Facebook, GitHub and with LinShare on Twitter and GitHub.
Interested in joining Linagora? Apply for job offers.
