Post #2346348

2026-05-07 11:27 UTC

@uriel@x.keinpfusch.net @strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz I don't understand how you make the jump to remote procedure calls? ActivityPub is everything but a remote procedure call, the other side is its own identity with its own policies about what to accept and how to process it. The definition of an RPC system is that the caller has control over the callee, just that they are talking over the network instead of the same process space

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@uriel@x.keinpfusch.net 2026-05-07 11:34

@Profpatsch@mastodon.xyz @strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz The definition of an RPC system is that the caller has control over the callee, just that they are talking over the network instead of the same process space Well, I can understand why RPCs are often perceived as being more “control-oriented”, because in practice you are explicitly invoking something like this_is_a_like_please_act_accordingly() inside the callee. But at the same time, when an ActivityPub message says that an object is a “Like”, what is really happening conceptually? The sender is still expressing an intended semantic effect, and the receiver is still expected to interpret that effect and react accordingly. Soo.... is not an RPC, sure, but the effect is as predicable as an RPC. So from my perspective, the distinction sometimes feels more about how semantics are described and negotiated, rather than about one model being purely declarative and the other purely imperative.

Open ##2346349