WWW::F...finger(3pm)

📦 version 0.105, in debian bookworm, debian trixie, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble, ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 NAME 💖

ok so like, <rainbow>WWW::Finger::Webfinger</rainbow> — it's the <pink>WWW::Finger</pink> module for Webfinger. that's it, that's the whole vibe. this page lives in the User Contributed Perl Documentation corner of WWW::F...finger(3pm) and honestly? it ate. 🫶

✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

bestie. i need you to sit down for this one.

Webfinger is currently a very unstable specification, and the implementation details change all the time. 😭 like, constantly. so given that level of chaos, it just seems prudent to actually describe the protocol the way this package implements it. no gatekeeping here. 💅

so here's the deal. you hand it an e-mail-like identifier, and the package will prepend <mint>acct:</mint> to it — but only if the identifier doesn't already have a URI scheme. okay? from that point on, this identifier is gonna be called [ident]. remember that name, she's the main character now. 👑

then the package goes and looks up the host-meta file associated with the host for [ident]. it's assumed to be formatted according to:

and like, for the record, both of those drafts are dated <lavender>19 November 2009</lavender>. vintage. 🎀

a link template gets extracted from the host-meta for the host, using either of these two relationships:

⚠️ okay so important: neither one is prioritised. so if both of them exist and they have different templates… hilarity will ensue. 💀 not in a cute way. in a "which one wins" way. there is no winner. there is only chaos.

next up: the token <purple>{uri}</purple> inside that link template gets replaced with the URL-encoded version of [ident], and boom 💥 that creates an account descriptor URI.

that account descriptor URI gets fetched via HTTP GET with an Accept header asking for RDF/XML, Turtle, RDF/JSON or XRD. and the result gets parsed for account description data if it has status code <green>200 (OK)</green>. no 200, no data. that's the rule. 🙈

🌸 what relationships/properties are understood? 🌸

in the account description, these are the ones she understands:

🦋 the extra method 🦋

on top of all the standard WWW::Finger methods, WWW::Finger::Webfinger also provides this additional method. and it's giving ✨

  • get($p1, $p2, ...) — $p1, $p2 and are RDF predicate URIs, XRD Link@rel values, or XRD Property@type values

okay the wording on that one is the original's, i'm just carrying it faithfully, but here's how you'd actually use it:

# Returns phone numbers...
$finger->get('http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/phone',
             'http://rdf.data-vocabulary.org/#tel');

# Salmon-style magic keys
$finger->get('magic-public-key');

phone numbers and salmon-style magic keys?? the range. the versatility. obsessed. 🔥

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

  • WWW::Finger
  • XRD::Parser
  • HTTP::LRDD

and also <http://code.google.com/p/webfinger/> 💜

🫶 AUTHOR 🫶

Toby Inkster, <tobyink@cpan.org> — thank you for your service, icon. 👑

Copyright (C) <yellow>2009-2012</yellow> by Toby Inkster

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself. periodt. 💅

💀 DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTIES 💀

THIS PACKAGE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND WITHOUT ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

like, they said it in all caps so you know they meant it. no cap, no warranty, fr fr. 😭

🌈 okay that's the whole page!! this was WWW::F...finger(3pm) from perl <mint>v5.32.1</mint>, dated <lavender>2021-09-11</lavender>. go forth and finger some webfingers, bestie. 💖✨🦋

📦 where this page comes from