Mozilla Weave in its current form, where it might go, where I want it to go

I’ve installed a recent version of Weave on my server. The server is 0.3, the client is 0.4. Weave is Mozilla‘s syncing protocol that aims to let Mozilla applications and extensions keep the same settings, saved passwords, histories, bookmarks and the like. This’d be useful for me because I use four computers on a regular basis (home desktop, Linux laptop, hackintosh netbook, university Linux desktop) and frequently get frustrated when I noticed that one machine is missing a useful Greasemonkey script or AdblockPlus rule.

I decided that I would install my own copy of Weave because I’d rather store my information on machines I own. The Mozilla folks are very unlikely to let my passwords get stolen or misused but that bit of paranoia hasn’t let me wrong so far. The installation of the Weave server scripts isn’t for the uninitated. Since it requires modification of apache configuration files you won’t be able to do it on a shared hosting plan, though you might be able to get around the aliases with some mod_rewrite voodoo.

It turns out that my paranoia isn’t warranted in this case. You only upload encrypted data. The data is encrypted with a passphrase separate from the Weave login, and the server never knows it. I don’t know how they implemented their encryption (other than the cipher is aes-256-cbc according to about:config) but I imagine the data is safe. The Mozilla folks say they can’t get at your data.

Weave is still too new to have a plan set in stone but Mozilla does have an idea of what they want it to do. The preferences for the client side extension list these as syncable items, though some are greyed out and don’t work: Bookmarks, cookies, extensions, forms, history, input history (location bar), microformats, passwords, plugins, preferences, tabs, and themes.

It looks like they’re trying to support OpenID too, but unfortunately it didn’t work on either my Basecamp login (it actually prevented me from login) or my WordPress install. The OpenID text field actually disappeared and was replaced with a “Sign in using Weave” button. I took a look and as it turns out, Weave assumes that you’re using Mozilla’s OpenID provider with the same username that you’ve signed in to Weave with. Not very helpful when I run an openid provider on imaddicted.ca and use tail.recursing.org for Weave. Fortunately you can click “(revert)” next to the button to get the OpenID text fields back. If you don’t use Mozilla’s OpenID provider you may as well change extensions.weave.openId.enabled to false in about:config. I’m sure that this behaviour is just a temporary thing while Weave is in alpha.

Fennec in need of Weave. Image by Getty Images via Daylife

The client side extension will also install in Thunderbird and Sunbird but won’t do anything as of yet. Fennec support is underway. Thunderbird would be easy to sync, keep your passwords in the cloud and let IMAP worry about which messages have been read. Sunbird is a little trickier. Will they sync calendars, or just the login details for shared calendars? Weave was intended to sync just metadata but calendars are more data than meta.

Weave has me intrigued. I see a lot of potential, especially in having a single sign-on for OpenID. What I’d like is for all Mozilla products to ship with Weave support. I want to be able to sit down at a friend’s desk, sign in to my Weave account (hosted on my own server, naturally) and have all my extensions plus settings and bookmarks at my disposal. I want Sunbird to snag all my calendars. I want Thunderbird to work. I want my Mozilla experience to be easily accessible whatever machine I’m on. I want to get rid of my USB key that contains Portable Firefox. I want it to work on Linux, OS X and Windows.  This is somewhat similar to Dion Almaer’s take on Weave in Ajaxian, although in its current form Weave is still useful to me.

Take a look at the screencast demo. Want to give Weave a go? Check out its Mozilla Labs page.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Weave 0.3 Released (labs.mozilla.com)
• Weave: Firefox Bookmark & Passwords Sync Add-on (shankrila.com)
• Mozilla’s Weave: (Too far) Ahead of its time (news.cnet.com)
• Who do I trust with my Identity? Erm, how about me? OpenID Weaves into the browser! (ajaxian.com)