Hedir Review : Hedir DB is open now

bret · Last edited by bret on Thu Apr 20, 2006 11:13 am

The Big Step in Hedir - Bigger yet to come for the biggest revolution

Hedir is going to open its Database (once approved by the community). The tables associated with Categories, site listings, votes e.t.c will be made public. The tables associated with User Information will always remain private to Hedir and will never be disclosed as per the privacy policy.

Why Part of the openness
There are many advantages of opening the DB for external developers. Let me pen down the first three:-

Search Engines like Google,Yahoo or MSN can integrate Human intelligence to the search results. SEs can get the total vote count and replies by accessing the DB through their search algorithm.
Other Developers can use the DB for various purposes, example finding the best universities in this world, or the better doctors near your location.
More contributions from the community in development (hedir and other web products).

There are thousands of things that can be done on top of this OpenDB. Hedir Platform will collect and distribute the human preferences for anything and everything through openDB (the simplest access possible).

Some Associated Queries

When will I get the username and password?
I have sent the username and password to some of our contributing members for beta testing. You too can request for one. Once approved by the community I will make it public. I am very excited about it. http://opendb.hedir.com
Won't it make Hedir slow?
Opendb.hedir.com is hosted in a different server and thus will not affect hedir.com performance.
What permissions will the DB user have?
To Select only.
What if I want to add something to Hedir DB?
We will provide the respective APIs, but they are still in the alpha stage.

Next Bigger steps

Making browser extensions (starting with firefox) which will allow users to see and add reviews for the browsing site. This will give hedir an extended reach.
Making the source open through sub version, we are starting with the firefox extension at http://svn.hedir.com/trac/hffe/wiki

All this make hedir a must for all. Your feedback as always will help Hedir community improve. Waiting for the community feedback and approval.

AjiNIMC · Joined: 11 Apr 2005 Posts: 516 18608 Hedir Points

Thanks for the invitation, the DB looks good. I am not able to delete or edit anything.

IMO this is really a great move. This move clearly shows that Hedir has a good vision and is not typically a dead category based directory.

I checked http://svn.hedir.com/trac/hffe/wiki and it looks very promising. I esp liked the search engine integration. If this is possible then I think Hedir is going to change the web.

GREAT MOVE HEDIR, I will surely blog about it. I think this is a true future of search engines, let Googles and Yahoos use Hedir for better search results.

AjiNIMC

bret · Posted: Wed Apr 19, 2006 4:45 pm Post subject:

If you haven't received the DB access details for beta account, please send me a pm (private message) and I will send the details through pm.

Google Junky · SuperMOD Joined: 01 Jan 2006 Posts: 3868 286 Hedir Points

Do you foresee any possible security risks in this open database? I mean a risk to Hedir...
That would be my only worry.

Señor COOL · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 4:20 am Post subject:

I may be the only one who thinks this way, but I do not like this idea at all for the most part (AjiNIMC, I don't think you've seen everything I'm referring to, since I'm making part reference to what Bret PMed me and I'm sure is going to be opened up soon.)

There are major issues here with security that I've got a serious concern about, based on what I've seen in the preview.

You're exposing what I would consider to be some very private and confidential company information (tax ID, employees, revenue) that, if you're collecting it at any point, everyone will have access to.
It wouldn't be extremely difficult for someone to unilaterally insert listings into the database and bypass the whole system, from the looks of it. I haven't tried for obvious reasons, but it looks like it would be fairly simple. I know it says there's only "Select" ability, but still...this is just too open.
You're exposing the database structure that makes HEDir unique to the competition, which in turn will eliminate some of HEDir's unique selling proposition.
We've already had one incident with hacking (i.e. the WMF vulnerability.) Open source = everyone has access = everyone who shouldn't have access has access. (Side note: this has been my major issue with open source from the beginning...never reveal things that could get you into trouble.)

No offense to Josh, because he seems like a good guy and a smart one, but if he's the only/primary developer working on HEDir, he's gonna get swamped dealing with this.

I don't mind the SE integration thing (although it would have to work with IE for it to be even remotely effective on a larger scale.) But what's wrong with RSS/XML, thus creating datasets that are read-only in nature and don't allow for easy manipulation?

In other words, why does the structure of the site have to be exposed along with the data (some of which shouldn't be exposed in the first place)? This doesn't make any sense to me at all.

Also, if SEs want to integrate it, for god's sake control it. Again, same deal. What would stop Dumbass from stealing the ranking system and using it to supplement their own crappy site listings?

You can give it away if you want, and that's part of what makes HEDir open, which is cool. But you're going WAY too far with this.

bret · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 11:36 am Post subject:

Point1: We have close to 300 tables and we have only exposed the category related forums which will not give away any personal information.
Point2: This is to breach a mysql security level which is not going to be an easy cake.
Point3: Every website will have its unique scheme and we are using atleast 10 open source application making the table count to over 300. We are just exposing few.
Point4: I have rechecked the hedir codes and it looks very secure and I with Lakhya's team can make it far more secure. Hedir is having a great architecture and I am sure we will be able to handle it.

Josh will not be all alone, Hedir has another Junior programmer working on few issues. I think this idea is really big and we can invest more for it. I will be spending more time with Hedir. I am working as a consultant too.

I will like to give a small example here:-
Firefox was open enough that I could easily develop an extension with Hedir team. In order to promote that extension I have to promote Firefox too. In this open world only an open architecture will be accepted as THE ARCHITECTURE for the industry.

http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/274/ , I liked this video which says, “So firms must ‘think about controlling architecture or influencing the architecture of the system and building the best products within it'”.

Regards,
bret

chatterfox · Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 2:52 am Post subject:

Hi, sorry to break in with a slighly different topic but I wuld just like to know how this DB exactly works and how will I operate into the log-in details I have received? If this is now open for public viewing, will non members now could submit sites for open review?

Thanks!

bret · Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 3:44 am Post subject:

chatterfox · Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 3:51 am Post subject:

Thanks!