Russell Beattie

Les has been very quiet lately, but that's because he's been heads down working on his Personal Proxy he's dubbed "Agent Frank" (it's got a little logo and everything). He just set up an Agent Frank WikiPage with download and install instructions.

I'm downloading now (it's pretty huge - like 11 megs), but the Wiki page has lots of good info, including Les' new acronym, PIIC:

Personal - While employing many traditionally server-side technologies, Agent Frank is intended to reside near the user, on the desktop or the laptop.

Intelligent - Agent Frank wants to learn about the user, observe preferences and habits, and become capable of automating many of the tedious tasks infovores face. Eventually, this will come to involve various forms of machine learning and analysis, & etc.

Intermediary - Amongst Agent Frank's facilities are network proxies that can be placed between local clients and remove servers. Using these, Agent Frank can tap into the user's online activities in order to monitor, archive, analyze, and alter information as it flows. For example, using a web proxy, Agent Frank can log sites visited, analyze content, filter out ads or harmful scripting.

Companion - Agent Frank's ultimate purpose is to accompany an infovore and assist along the way.

Very cool. I'm going to start playing right now.

-Russ

Later... Urgh! It's GPLed! Bleh!