[spec] Using a gitlab

[Sean Conner]

It was thus said that the Great Liam once stated:
> I did find the GitLab move strange. IMO it's not very "mission coherent" to 
> develop a lightweight alternative to the web on a site that shows a blank 
> white page without JavaScript enabled.

  First off, as Stéphane has pointed out, people (and it was many people, by
the way) were complaining about all the talk on the mailing list.  The
mailing list was created *to talk about the Gemini protocol* and to hash the
details out.  Perhaps that wasn't stated strongly enough on the sign up
page, but I do have to wonder what other people expectd out the list.
Personally, I never found the volumn overwhelming, but then again, I've been
on lists that have had 100+ messages per day, sustained (and a person high
of 500 messages in a single day).

  Second, about that "lightweight alternative to the web" bit ... having
been involved with Gemini since before the mailing list, it was clear to me
that Gemini was never about a "lightweight alternative to the web" but an
improved gopher.  I think thinking of Gemini in terms of the web leads to
all these proposed extensions (size, caching, uploads, etc.).  I think it's
a failure to set expectations, but that's me.

  Third, a bit more about that "lightweight alternative to the web" bit ...
here's a TL;DR summary of the protocol:

	The client connects to TCP port 1965 using TLS 1.2 or higher.  The
	client then sends a URI and a CR, LF pair to make a request.  The
	server then replies with a status line consisting of two digits, a
	space, some additional information depending upon the status, a CR,
	LF pair, and then in the case of success, the conent.  The server
	then closes the connection.

  Simple right?

TLS---people bitched about that.  Drop support for 1.2.  Drop TLS and use
this alternative scheme I just read about.  Drop TLS entirely.  Make TLS
optional!

TLS certificates---people bitched about that.  Let's Encypt certificates? 
TOFU?  How to TOFU?  What to save for TOFU?  Don't use Let's Encrypt.  Don't
bother with validating server certificates.

URI---people bitched about that.  ASCII only?  Use IRIs!  That's too hard! 
Is not!  Is too!  S'not!  S'too!  What about fragemnts?  What about them? 
Hey!  data: is a URI!  No, ban those!  No, they're valid URIs!  They'll
allow inlined images!  So?  That's bad!

The CR, LF pair---people bitched about that.  Why both? Why not just LF?  It
saves a byte!  It's too hard to deal with!  Saving a byte?  What, with the
overhead of TCP (40 bytes per packet)?  And TLS (several additional
packets).

The status line---people bitched about that!  There are too few status
codes!  There are too many status codes!  Let's use single digit status
codes!  Let's use tripple digit status codes!  Let's use double digit status
codes!  We need redirection!  We don't need redirection!  Yes we do!  And
Gone.  Really?  We need senstive input.  No we don't, it's security theater.

The MIME type for status 20---people bitched about that!  Not about the MIME
bit directly, but about the parameters!  It allows extensions!  Strictly
limit the parameters!  That will complicate clients because there are a lot
of MIME types, with a lot of different parameters!  But extentions!  

  And this is *JUST* for the protocol.  Please check the mailing list
archives from 2019 onward---the bikeshedding that went on about text/gemini
makes the above look trivial in nature.  Simple?  Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

> The suggestion of SourceHut sounds like a good compromise if it's true that 
> one can participate without an account.

  I'm the one responsible for setting up the gitlab issue tracker for
Gemini.  It was suggested I set one up using gitlab (and no, I won't say who
made the suggestion).  I knew that github was off the table for this crowd,
so I bit the bullet, created a gitlab account and went to town.  I was not
familiar with the other alternatives at the time, and people were *massively
bitching* about the volume on the mailing list.

  I completely disagree with participation without an account.  I'm sorry,
but my experience with Gemini has shown that it's all too easy to bitch
about it than to do anything about it.  That IRI thing?  As far as I know,
only *two* people (and I'm one of them) actually bothered implementing IRI
support, just to see how difficult it was.  TWO!  There are way more than
TWO people who demand IRIs, and about an equal number who decry IRIs, and
out of this lot, only TWO people bothered to try, and right now, between
those two peple, 50% are ready to dump the idea into the dumpster fire out
back (for the record, I'm that 50%), because the two camps are mostly
talking about theory.  Anyway, to get back onto the point---if you want to
bitch about Gemini, I think it's fair to have some skin, however minimal, in
the game.  If setting up an account is too much, tough!

  I AM aware that there may be some technical difficulties in using gitlab
and there are some who would participate that are otherwise unable to do so. 
For them, yes, the mailing list is still good---I do follow both (and yes,
that means I hit *each and every* issue page on gitlab nearly everyday, even
if I don't reply).  

> I've only been a watcher of the spec process so far, but if contributing 
> involved making a GitLab account and keeping up with changes there then 
> that's not a barrier I'd cross. But I haven't been contributing so that 
> opinion weighs very little.

  You don't need an account to follow the gitlab issues.  You just can't
comment on them without an account.

  -spc