I’m trying to start my own lemmy instance, and reading through the documentation at https://join-lemmy.org/docs/administration/federation_getting_started.html it looks like we need to manually search for just about everything that can be found on other lemmy instances.

It works. I’m able to search for communities/comments/posts and then my instance will load only that community/comment chain/post and only after I’ve searched it. No updates.

Is this what we’re supposed to be doing? Seems pretty tedious to have someone that’s supposed to go to other instances and then search for all of their content on my instance in order to federate with it.

I have a feeling there is an easier way, but I’m legitimately not seeing it.

Right now, it looks like the only way users on my instance will get to see content from other instances is if I manually search for just about everything they’ll get to see.

I can write a crawler to automate all of this, but I’d rather not unless it’s completely necessary.

  • squaresinger@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    11 minutes ago

    That’s how federation is supposed to work. If one user searches content, you get it once. If a user of your instance subscribes to a community, you get updates for that community.

    The point is to reduce load on your instance by not federating content that nobody on your instance needs.

    It’s based on a flawed understanding of how communities work, specifically that reddit-style forums only work well when you have huge communities that everyone sibscribes to. So, most instances end up with most content anyway.

    Also, keep in mind, all conent that has been federated to your instance is on your srver and thus legally your responsibility. If there’s illegal content on there, you are liable if you don’t delete it.

    • uhdeuidheuidhed@thelemmy.clubOPEnglish
      2·
      9 hours ago

      Thanks, this looks interesting.

      I tried adding my instance under “Manage Instances” but got this error: Request timed out: GET https://{INTERNAL_IP}/nodeinfo/2.1

      I’m not sure what this means. Could anyone help provide an explanation?

      • FrostyTrichs@crazypeople.onlineEnglish
        3·
        9 hours ago

        Sorry but I’m not sure. Every time I’ve used that tool the setup has gone flawlessly. The first time you use it you put in your instance URL and it should output something for you to add to your DNS records. If you just made the DNS changes it can take a few minutes to several hours for those changes to be pushed out.

        • uhdeuidheuidhed@thelemmy.clubOPEnglish
          2·
          7 hours ago

          Thank you. I think I figured it out.

          In my lemmy.hjson file, I accidentally put the internal IP address of my server instead of the domain name. This was a carry-over from testing on my main machine by using an IP address and port forwarding because I didn’t have a domain name to use.

          I changed the hostname setting in lemmy.hjson to my domain name, and now it seems to be working. Sort of.

          Now I have a different error, “Your instance is not guaranteed in Fediseer. Please check fediseer.com”, but this one seems less of a technical issue. I will have to learn what this is about and hopefully I can get it to work :)

          • FrostyTrichs@crazypeople.onlineEnglish
            2·
            6 hours ago

            You’ll have to claim your instance on fediseer and have another instance endorse yours. It’s a system of trust to help keep bad actors from having too much influence over the platform and causing others grief.

            • uhdeuidheuidhed@thelemmy.clubOPEnglish
              2·
              6 hours ago

              Thanks yet again.

              I tried claiming my instance, but now I’m getting the error: API Key PM failed

              Slowly and steadily, this problem will be solved!

              • FrostyTrichs@crazypeople.onlineEnglish
                2·
                6 hours ago

                IIRC the way it works is by PMing you the API key to get started and you’re failing at that point. Are you sure your instance is federating? I don’t know anything about how fediseer works on the backend but if it’s not able to send you a PM that suggests you might not be federating at all or maybe you’re running a whitelist or something? I’d start investigating if your instance is reachable from other instances and if you’re able to send yourself a PM from another instance.

                • uhdeuidheuidhed@thelemmy.clubOPEnglish
                  2·
                  5 hours ago

                  You’re probably right.

                  I’m trying to look up a user on my instance from another insance with theirinstance.com/u/myuser@myinstance.com and it’s not working.

                  I’m not sure what could be causing this, it could be something simple like the previous issue I had earlier with the domain name. I’m going to go through my settings and try to figure this one out, but I’m still kind of new to all of this so it may take some time.

  • jollyroberts@jolly-piefed.jomandoa.netEnglish
    1·
    6 hours ago

    Piefed has a couple of different ways to populate a new server. Pulling lemmyverse data and subscribing to comms that way, or scanning a remote Lemmy/mbin/pieces server for comms. You can look at that code if you want inspiration.

  • tofu@lemmy.nocturnal.gardenEnglish
    4·
    10 hours ago

    That’s basically how it’s done. Searching for them isn’t enough I think, in order to get updates, a user from your instance needs to subscribe, so a crawler might create a list of communities, but it won’t see news.

    Yes, starting a new instance is tedious work.

  • frongt@lemmy.zipEnglish
    3·
    10 hours ago

    There’s a bot you can use to jump-start federation. No idea what it’s called, but I’m sure you can find it with a few seconds of searching.

  • Steve@communick.newsEnglish
    2·
    9 hours ago

    Right now, it looks like the only way users on my instance will get to see content from other instances is if I manually search for just about everything they’ll get to see.

    They can do that themselves.