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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
3/ At the moment most apps create these from scratch and keep them contained within their ecosystem. You canโ€™t move blocks from one app to another. So we keep reinventing the same blocks over and over. Everyone spends more time building. Fewer people get to use whatโ€™s been made
Three block based apps with three different table blocks inside them, with red crosses between them signalling that you can't move any of these table blocks between the applications
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
4/ The Block Protocol (BP) is an attempt to save us from this sad fate of walled block gardens. Blocks that follow the protocol can be embedded into any app that follows the protocol. Itโ€™s the DMZ of interoperability. Build a block once, embed it anywhere that accepts BP blocks
A diagram of a single block that displays a book cover, title, and author being embedded into three separate web apps that follow the Block Protocol.
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
5/ BP blocks can *read data* from the apps theyโ€™re embedded in, and send suggested updates back. Blocks declare what kind of data they expect to receive (numbers, strings, email address) & what they can do with it (display, transform) Which leads us to structured dataโ€ฆ
A web app with blocks inside. An arrow shows that the web app's database can send data to the blocks inside it, and a dashed arrow in the other direction shows a block can send suggested updates back to the database.
A diagram of the UI structure of a block showing slots where an image, name, and a set of three tasks can fit. We also see a diagram of the data structure the block expects to receive; it expects a Person object that has a picture, a name, and a tasklist.
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
6/ One lofty, formidable dream weโ€™re going after with the BP is to help enable the semantic web. The possible data types that BP blocks accept arenโ€™t just numbers and strings. They also recognise things humans would recognise as types: Person, Company, Book, Movie, etc.
A list of human-friendly types blocks might accept that includes Person, Book, Movie, Company, Article, Game, Festival, Restaurant, Recipe, Flight, and Map. We also see a diagram of the "Recipe" and "Flight" types going into two blocks that visually display their data inside of blocks.
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
7/ We can define these human types with โ€˜schemasโ€™ โ€“ sets of properties and values. Eg. A โ€œflightโ€ schema would have properties like โ€œdepartureAirportโ€ and โ€œflightNumberโ€ This enables us to build specialised blocks that display specific kinds of data. Blocks likeโ€ฆ
A diagram of the schema for a flight showing the typical properties a flight might have; a departure time, a flight number, an airline, and a departure and arrival airport. We see this schema pointing towards a JSON file that holds the values of these properties inside it. Eg. departure airport: "LHR". We then see than JSON object being passed into a block component that renders it with a graphical display of the flight number, destination, and a small map of the flight path.
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
9/ Thereโ€™s been a ๐Ÿฆ†-ton of previous work on schemas & the semantic web. Weโ€™re not reinventing any wheels. Weโ€™re respectfully building off previous art. People can use existing schemas (eg. schema.org), BUT we also let people extend schemas and define their ownโ€ฆ
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
10/ There is no perfect, universal schema system, and never will be. Human categories & hierarchies are subjective, fluid, & always evolving. People will use schemas that make sense to them, then extend & adapt schemas to fit their needs. Itโ€™s a free-schema-worldโ€ฆ
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
12/ To recap: We now have a standard wayโ€ฆ to create reusable blocksโ€ฆ that can read / write semantic dataโ€ฆ and be used in any app that opts into the ecosystem. Which saves us from block fortresses. And blocks create structured data by default, without devs manually doing it.
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Maggie ๐Ÿ”œ visting SFO ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ธ
@Mappletons
If you're a developer curious about building blocks and want to keep tabs on the project, โญ๏ธ starring and ๐Ÿ‘€ watching the Github repository is a good way to get updates: github.com/blockprotocol/ I'll add updates here in the coming months too. It's early days; we're just beginning
github.com
GitHub - blockprotocol/blockprotocol: The open block protocol รž
The open block protocol รž. Contribute to blockprotocol/blockprotocol development by creating an account on GitHub.
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