alphabet

From IndieWeb


An alphabet refers to the set of symbols used by a particular writing system, typically as building blocks, like A-Z for English, and in the context of IndieWeb, we can use them to refer to key IndieWeb building blocks.

Please update this alphabet with additional terms for each letter as new building blocks appear and gain prominence in the IndieWeb. Please only change the first term for a letter if it really is the most prominent building block for that letter for the IndieWeb.

Articles

IndieWeb Alphabet

Here's an A-Z alphabet of IndieWeb building blocks, choosing a primary one for each (with perhaps a few secondary / also rans)

  • A is for article and less often audio posts such as podcasts, as well as having an archive UI, and the authorship algorithm.
  • B is for backfeed as well Bridgy, the awesome backfeed as a service proxy, and bookmark posts
  • C is for checkin, collection, & comics posts, and communication, in particular having a contact page, as well as the create UI pattern. Culturally, we have commons and our code-of-conduct.
  • D is for design, as well as the delete protocol in which the IndieWeb uses HTTP 410 Gone for decentralized deletions, and the disclosure UI pattern.
  • E is for event, edit, and exercise posts
  • F is for food posts, follow posts which are how you express in a decentralized way that you're following someone's posts, fragmentions - how you mention part of the text in a post or on a page, the facepile UI pattern, and file-storage, a common alternative to databases used by many in the IndieWeb.
  • G is for generations - a key building block for IndieWeb adoption, activism, and advocacy.
  • H is for homepage - everyone should have one and own their own, HTML & HTTPS of course, and for community the Homebrew Website Club.
  • I is for IndieAuth and IndieMark, less frequently invitation posts, indie-config, and for community IndieWeb and IndieWebCamp of course.
  • J is for jam posts, where you post what music you're currently jamming to.
  • K is for Known, perhaps the most popular IndieWeb-supporting-by-default CMS.
  • L is for like posts, and our longevity principle
  • M is for microformats and Micropub, less frequently marginalia, and a reminder to make sure your site works well on mobile
  • N is for note, perhaps the simplest and most fundamental IndieWeb post type, and notifications
  • O is for ownyourdata, a key indieweb incentive, motivation, rallying cry, and hashtag, as well as the excellent OwnYourGram service for automatically PESOSing your Instagram photos to your own site via micropub.
  • P is for posts with permalinks, also photo posts, POSSE as key distinguishing feature of the IndieWeb, or PESOS if you have to, and person-tags. See also PubSubHubbub and of course our cultural principles including encouraging a plurality of projects
  • Q is for quotation posts, as well as the open source Quill micropub client.
  • R is for reply, perhaps the second most common type of indieweb post, and its related reply-context UI pattern, but also repost posts, and having an integrated reader as a building block of your site rather than a separate thing.
  • S is for a stream of posts, at least one or more on your homepage or other pages, as well as scrobble & sleep posts, and our selfdogfood principle
  • T is for text-first design, and travel posts, tags, as well as the community timeline of key IndieWeb terms/ideas/concepts
  • U is for UX - short for user experience, one of our primary focuses and principles, inclusive of UI short for user interface, as well as URL design.
  • V is for video posts, as well as Vouch - a Webmention extension for reducing or preventing spam.
  • W is for Webmention, less frequently webactions, for community wikifying, and the popular IndieWeb-capable-with-plugins WordPress project, as well as the Woodwind indieweb reader.
  • X is for XFN - the increasingly ironically named XHTML Friends Network, a spec in wide use for identity and authentication with rel=me, and less frequently for other values like contact, acquaintance, friend, etc.
  • Y is for YAGNI - short for "You Aren't Gonna Need It" and one of the best ways the IndieWeb community has found to both simplify, and/or debunk & fight off more complex proposals (often from academics or enterprise architects).
  • Z is for Z time, AKA zero offset from UTC, a common technique used by indieweb servers and projects to avoid problems with timezones.

See Also