A couple of topics to bring to your attention this week - let’s look at them.

FDC3 for the Web

While FDC3 (the standard) isn’t language-specific, a lot of the current documentation skews towards javascript applications running inside an Electron container. There have been attempts in the past (such as Nick Kolba’s/FINOS’ FDC3 Desktop Agent and Tick42’s Glue Core+) to provide a Chrome Extension to allow FDC3 to work in the browser, but a standards-compliant way of writing an FDC3 app without electron or a browser extension is currently elusive.

This is where the FDC3 for Web Browsers comes in. This aims to provide a standard way for javascript/typescript apps running in either electron or in a web browser to obtain the FDC3 API.  Practically, this means that FDC3 apps can be written without including desktop-agent-vendor specific libraries or browser extensions, which prevents vendor lock-in, aids adoption and allows apps to run on any FDC3-conformant desktop agent.  

Work on the specification for this is hotting up and the working group (which meets every two weeks) are nearly ready to start looking at implementations. Exciting stuff! Come along if you feel you have a voice to add to the discussions.

Identity and Threat Modeling: Call for Help

At the FINOS members meeting we had a very successful session discussing the topic of identity in FDC3. Here is the presentation that Yannick Malins and Vinay Mistry gave and here is a video of Yannick’s prize-winning proof-of-concept from the BMO hackathon.

The FDC3 maintainers group met last week and discussed next steps towards founding a working group on this topic.  

So here’s the ask: Would you be interested in helping the FDC3 community by chairing the Identity and Threat Modeling Working Group? If so, get in touch with me! 

Author: Rob Moffat

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