3575fc337d
A port of the existing user manual over to reStructuredText and using Sphinx to generate the documentation to see if it would be a suitable replacement for the existing php generated method.
41 lines
1.9 KiB
ReStructuredText
41 lines
1.9 KiB
ReStructuredText
What is GNU social
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==================
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GNU social is a social network for microblogging. It enables you to publish
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short notices including URLs and pictures. If you're interested in what someone
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has to say you can follow them. When you log in to your account you see a
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timeline containing all of the notices from people that you follow. You can
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have a conversation with another person by replying to each other's notices.
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.. image:: ../../resources/user/gnusocialno_general_small.png
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:alt: Homepage of gnusocial.no
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:align: center
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:target: ../_images/gnusocialno_general.png
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.. |gnusocialno_general| image:: ../../resources/user/gnusocialno_general.png
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You may have seen this sort of thing before. GNU social is special for two main
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reasons: it's *decentralised*, and it's *free software*.
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Being decentralised means that there is no single server that controls GNU
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social. Instead, many servers are run by different people around the world.
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These servers communicate with each other to form a *federation*. You can
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create an account on any one of them. Although the servers sometimes look
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different, ultimately it doesn't matter which one you choose—you're still part
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of the same network as everyone else.
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.. image:: ../../resources/user/federation.png
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:align: center
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If one server suffers an outage it's inconvenient for the people who have an
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account on that particular server. The rest of the network continues to operate
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as normal. This makes GNU social highly resilient. Censorship is difficult as
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servers can be located anywhere in the world.
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Because GNU social is free software it's here to stay. A corporate social
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network might disappear or start running advertisements when the venture
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capital runs out. The GNU social code is available to everybody and there are
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many servers where it's free to create an account.
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This is a social network that does what's best for the people who use it—not
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what makes the most money.
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