User:Pinfold

Build a Python CRUD interface for the Solid server at https://solidcommunity.net (managed by the Open Data Institute) allowing structured programmatic interaction with Solid Pods and demonstrating decentralized data principles in action.

Below is a structured work plan focusing on clarity, security, and reusability.

🧭 Objective

Develop a Python-based CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) interface for interacting with user data stored on Solid Pods hosted at https://solidcommunity.net.

The interface will:

Authenticate via Solid OIDC (OpenID Connect)

Perform RDF-based data operations (read/write triples)

Be modular and reusable in scripts or web apps

🧩 1. Background & Setup

1.1. Understand the Solid Protocol

Review Solid Protocol and Solid API.

Understand:

• WebID: User identity (https://username.solidcommunity.net/profile/card#me)
• Pod: Personal data store (https://username.solidcommunity.net/public/)
• Access control: Uses WAC or ACP
• Authentication: OIDC using solidcommunity.net as the issuer

1.2. Development Environment

Install dependencies:

python3 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
pip install requests rdflib solid-auth-client

(We’ll use requests for HTTP, rdflib for RDF parsing, and a Python OIDC client for authentication.)

🧠 2. Authentication Module

2.1. Register an App with solidcommunity.net

Visit: https://solidcommunity.net/registerApp

Obtain:

client_id

client_secret

redirect_uri

2.2. Implement OIDC Flow

Use solid_oidc or a generic OIDC library like requests-oauthlib:

from requests_oauthlib import OAuth2Session

authorization_base_url = "https://solidcommunity.net/.well-known/openid-configuration" token_url = "https://solidcommunity.net/token"

solid = OAuth2Session(client_id, redirect_uri=redirect_uri) authorization_url, state = solid.authorization_url(authorization_base_url) print("Visit:", authorization_url)

1. After user grants access, use callback URL

token = solid.fetch_token(token_url, client_secret=client_secret, authorization_response=callback_url)

✅ Deliverable: Authenticated access token for use in CRUD operations.

🧱 3. Core CRUD Functions

Define a class SolidPodClient:

import requests from rdflib import Graph

class SolidPodClient:

   def __init__(self, base_url, access_token):
       self.base_url = base_url.rstrip('/')
       self.headers = {"Authorization": f"Bearer {access_token}"}

   def read(self, path):
       url = f"{self.base_url}/{path.lstrip('/')}"
       r = requests.get(url, headers=self.headers)
       g = Graph()
       g.parse(data=r.text, format='turtle')
       return g

   def create(self, path, data, content_type="text/turtle"):
       url = f"{self.base_url}/{path.lstrip('/')}"
       r = requests.put(url, headers={**self.headers, "Content-Type": content_type}, data=data)
       return r.status_code

   def update(self, path, data, content_type="text/turtle"):
       return self.create(path, data, content_type)

   def delete(self, path):
       url = f"{self.base_url}/{path.lstrip('/')}"
       return requests.delete(url, headers=self.headers).status_code

✅ Deliverable: A reusable Python module that can:

Read RDF data from the Pod

Write (create/update) new resources

Delete resources

⚙️ 4. Testing and Verification

4.1. Test Environment

Use a test Pod at https://yourusername.solidcommunity.net/public/test/.

4.2. Example Operations

1. Example: Create a resource

data = """ @prefix schema: <http://schema.org/> . <> a schema:Event ;

  schema:name "Cully Community Meeting" ;
  schema:startDate "2025-11-10" .

""" client.create("public/test/event.ttl", data)

1. Example: Read resource

graph = client.read("public/test/event.ttl") for s, p, o in graph:

   print(s, p, o)

🔐 5. Access Control (Optional Extension)

5.1. Web Access Control (WAC)

Solid allows .acl files to specify access:

@prefix acl: <http://www.w3.org/ns/auth/acl#> . <#owner>

   a acl:Authorization ;
   acl:agent <https://yourusername.solidcommunity.net/profile/card#me> ;
   acl:accessTo <./event.ttl> ;
   acl:mode acl:Read, acl:Write, acl:Control .

5.2. Automate ACL Management

Add an optional set_permissions() function to your client.

🚀 6. Packaging and Distribution

Organize your code as a Python package:

solid_client/ ├── __init__.py ├── auth.py ├── client.py ├── utils.py

Add a setup.py and README.md

Optional: Publish to PyPI as solid-crud-client

📘 7. Future Enhancements

Feature Description

• 🧩 JSON-LD Support Parse/write JSON-LD data natively
• 🔄 SPARQL Queries Support querying via SPARQL endpoints
• 🔒 DID/VC Authentication Integrate W3C DIDs and Verifiable Credentials
• 🌐 Web Interface Build a lightweight Streamlit or Flask UI
• 📊 Integration Connect with Semantic MediaWiki or Linked Data dashboards
• 🗂️ Summary Timeline

Study Solid protocol and register app

Implement authentication and token retrieval

Build SolidPodClient CRUD module

Test against solidcommunity.net Pods

Add ACL and RDF utilities

Package and document

Would you like me to generate a starter Python repository (with full file structure and working code for authentication + CRUD) so you can clone and start from it?