Since we are in the fediverse, I think it would be convenient to have a fediverse-wide resolvable fediverse URI scheme, that would look like so:
fediverse://
edit: Found a relevant FEP: https://codeberg.org/fediverse/fep/src/branch/main/fep/07d7/fep-07d7.md
It could continue running on HTTP(S). Did you know browsers and OSs can handle different URL schemas than the ones they natively open (
http,https,file,data)? Ever saw amailto,magnet,ms-wordetc. URL schema? They can be opened with an in-browser or native app of your choice, and this has worked for years. Yes, clients would need to be patched for support but that’s easy. I would only add “instance’s native UI” as a fallback for people coming from outside the fediverse.Mail clients, torrent clients, and word processors are fundamentally different from browsers. Yes, we can implement their base functions inside a web browser, but that’s not their function, or their core UX principle. Also, you forgot NNTP. Thee is no value in moving away from HTTP(S).
We’re not suggesting moving away from the HTTPS protocol. Gmail and other web email apps, as well as Word Online etc. still use HTTPS to communicate with their backend infrastructure. They are just registered in your browser as apps that can handle the
mailto://orms-word://URL schema. This registering most likely happens automatically when you have visited a page that supports the schema sofediverse://links would continue working for Fediverse users - they’d see a prompt to open the link with their home instance’s web app (its web interface like the default web UI) or a dedicated web app they are already using like Voyager. What would need to change is just a minor thing: browsers would need to offer the default web UI of target instance as fallback: for example, even if you haven’t visited any Fediverse site yet, the linkfediverse://lemmy.example.com/post/1337will show “lemmy.example.com web interface” in the “Open with…” option list, redirecting tohttps://lemmy.example.com/post/1337.