It's an alternative front end
this post was submitted on 15 Oct 2023
21 points (88.9% liked)
Ask Lemmy
26890 readers
1685 users here now
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try [email protected]
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either [email protected] or [email protected].
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email [email protected]. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
what does that mean for people that don't understand what the term "front end" means?
Most online software actually has two separate pieces of software.
One (front end) runs locally on your device, i.e. an app or a webpage on a browser after it has loaded. This is responsible for interfacing directly with the user, converting human input into ones and zeros and vice versa.
The other (back end) runs on the webserver/host/company that your device (and many others) is talking to. It is responsible for storing and giving data/content, managing user accounting information, policing the interactions between users and security.
It is typical to have a single backend which coordinates data sharing among and between users, and to have multiple front ends, each of which takes a different approach to interacting with the user.
For example, lemmy instances are primarily responsible for running a single backend and also send you a copy of the default front end when you open the site in a browser. But you could use another front in software instead. And have it talk to the backend without first downloading a copy of the front end software.
Lemmy Is also a bit special in that it shares data between instances (other, similar backend software) and even entirely different server software (via a common data protocol called activitypub
omg, i finally know what people are talking about!! thank you very much 😊
Plainly, the user-facing pieces of a website that make it work.
If you go further and ask "like what", it's going to get more technical (like html, css, javascript, rest, jwt, cookies, etc.).
It's an alternative user interface.
Easily explained
It is like a Webservice that offers a different look for Lemmy. Like a theme but with more functions.
Wrong community.
But to answer, it's a different frontend for Lemmy. There's the default, Alexendrite, Photon, mlmym.
- https://a.lemdro.id is Alexendrite
- https://p.lemdro.id/ is Photon
- https://old.lemdro.id/ is mlmym
Different apps, same way to browse lemmy.