how Mastodon's federated timeline works (just in time for masto to rework it!)
let's start with local.
a post appears on the local timeline if
- it's from a local user
- it's public ( 🌎 ) privacy
and either
- it's a new post (not continuing a thread) or
- it's in a self-reply thread (no other accounts upthread of it)
that's how local works.
for federated, instead of
- it's from a local user
you have
- your instance knows that it exists
how does your instance know a post exists? could be any reason.
- maybe a user on the instance follows the poster
- maybe a user on the instance follows another poster who boosted it
- maybe a user on the instance searched for the post URL
- maybe the instance is subscribed to a relay that sent it across
doesn't actually matter
point is, if a post *federates* (ayyy) to your instance and it's local-eligible, it shows up on federated.[1]
- 🎒
[1] unless the account/instance is limited/silenced and it's removed.[2]
[2] unless you follow the limited/silenced account and it's put back.
summary of masto privacy levels because why not
who sees a direct post?
- anyone @'ed in it. unless they're like blocked or something.
...and if followers-only, also:
- anyone following the posting account (whether or not the posting account follows back) when the post was made.
...and if unlisted, also-also:
- anyone who gets the post boosted into their tl (if it's followers-only or direct, no boosts!)
...and if it's public, also-also-also:
- the local timeline, if eligible (see above)
- some number of federated timelines, ditto (ditto)
- the search timeline for every hashtag the post contains
for us, unlisted is default and public is the special "broadcast to the world" privacy level for special occasions
- 🎒
re: summary of masto privacy levels because why not
@packbat since october 2018 there has been a FIFTH, undocumented, status visibility, the limited visibility, which was introduced to honor the visibility of google+ circles, which some mastodon-compatible software allows (and which is purrfectly allowed by the AP specs); explicitly mentioned users can see the post, but it’s not viewed as a DM. (the ability to have “silent” (that is, non-notifying) mentions was introduced at the same time so that you don’t necessarily ping everybody who can see the post)
fur some reason, such posts are shown to users as “private” visibility, even though that is not really correct
now the absolutely wild part is that the status creation API endpoint will just let you try to create a limited visibility post!! but that’s pretty useless, because there is no way to create silent mentions from that endpoint; you would have to ping everybody you wanted to see the post anyway as if it were a DM
re: summary of masto privacy levels because why not
@aescling *weird!*
- 🎒
re: summary of masto privacy levels because why not
@packbat the API docs don’t even mention this! but if you try it, it works! not that it’s useful!!
re: summary of masto privacy levels because why not
@packbat anyway this does mean mastodon is a bit of hacking away from having circles in some form
(though making a good UI and just overall UX fur this is purrobably nontrivial)
re: summary of masto privacy levels because why not
@aescling why not - go for it!