Nikola Smolenski wrote:
On Monday 20 October 2003 19:06, Louis Kyu Won Ryu
wrote:
>>Now, I could just start an open source project at sourceforge to
>>collaboratively develop it further. BUT: I am afraid of the power of
>>this software, and the damage it could do if it ends up in the wrong
>>hands (vandals).
>
>My two cents:
>
>1. Change your bot so that it adds a User-agent header to the HTTP
>requests that identifies the request as coming from a bot (unless you've
>already done this).
Brion asked me to do that earlier, so it is recognizable.
2. Ask Brion
or someone to add a check for the "User-agent: Bot" and
then check the already-exising "bot" flag in the user record, and toss
out the edit if it is made from other than a "bot" user.
3. Once this is done, release your source.
Quick and easy. Now, to be sure, anyone with software skills can change
the source so that it doesn't produce the header. But then, anyone with
software skills can write their own bot.
Yes, but one is much easier then other.
I propose that critical part of source (one that reads and writes data on
Wikipedia), with the enhancements that Louis proposed, should be stored in a
library which would be freely distributable but closed source. Then the rest
of the bot code could be released open source.
Unfortunately that will not work, as the 'bot is written in python,
which is source code or VM code which can be easily disassembled. And
even without disassembly it is easy to "modify" the library in a running
program.
I'm still not sure what to do. If I can't get any definite opinion
formed on this list, I will open an open-source project for the robot at SF.
Rob
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Rob W.W. Hooft || rob(a)hooft.net ||
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