Portable Import/Export Format for XMPP-IM Servers

%ents; ]>

Portable Import/Export Format for XMPP-IM Servers This document specifies a file format for importing and exporting user data to and from XMPP-IM servers. &LEGALNOTICE; 0227 Experimental Standards Track Standards Council XMPP IM XEP-0049 XEP-0054 TO BE ASSIGNED Magnus Henoch henoch@dtek.chalmers.se legoscia@jabber.cd.chalmers.se 0.1 2007-08-08 psa

Initial published version.

0.0.1 2007-07-27 mh

Initial version.

Different implementations of XMPP-IM servers store user data in various ways, and many implementations have more than one storage format. This leads to problems when a server administrator wants to switch to another implementation or storage format -- the implementation is as likely as not to have an import mechanism that can read the user data in its current form. This document attempts to solve that problem by defining a common file format for import and export of user data in XMPP-IM servers.

The following constraints are imposed on this standard:

The data is stored in a single file.

For the convenience of server administrators, a single file holds all relevant data.
The file format is XML-based.

XMPP-IM servers already have tools to process XML data. This also allows extension of the format using namespaces. Furthermore, some of the data that needs to be stored is by definition already in XML form.
All user data is stored, but no server configuration data.

User data has similar form throughout the XMPP world, but server configuration is implementation-specific. Therefore this specification does not attempt to transfer any aspects of the server configuration from one server to another.

Furthermore, the contents of MUC, Pubsub and other services are out of scope for this specification.
Multiple virtual hosts are supported.

Many server implementations can serve several hostnames in a single server instance. Thus this specification allows storing data from several virtual hosts.

Exporting server.

The XMPP-IM server writing its user data into a file, following this specification.
Importing server.

The XMPP-IM server reading data from such a file.

Data is contained in a single XML file, whose root element is <server-data/> qualified by the 'http://www.xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0227.html#ns' namespace &NSNOTE;.

[ ... ] ]]>

At any point in the file, an exporting server may put elements qualified by a namespace not mentioned in this specification. The exported data SHOULD be meaningful without the extensions. An importing server that encounters a namespace that it doesn't understand, or otherwise is unable to import all given data, SHOULD ignore the unknown data, SHOULD notify the operator, and MAY offer to terminate the process.

The child elements of the <server-data/> elements are <host/> elements. Each <host/> element describes a virtual host, and has a 'jid' attribute that contains its JID.

An importing server MAY automatically adjust its list of virtual hosts to fit the ones present in the data being imported. If it does not, it SHOULD notify the operator about any mismatch.

[ ... ] [ ... ] ]]>

Each user is represented by a <user/> element under the <host/> element. The <user/> element MUST have a 'name' attribute, which contains the node part of the user's JID, and SHOULD have a 'password' attribute, which contains the user's password.

[ ... ] [ ... ] ]]>

Each <user/> element SHOULD contain the user's roster in the form of a <query/> element qualified by the 'jabber:iq:roster' namespace. This element contains the user's roster in the same format as when retrieving the roster from the server, as described in section 7.3 of &xmppim;.

Friends ]]>

If the exporting server stores messages received while the user was offline, it SHOULD include an <offline-messages/> element as a child of the <user/> element. This element contains all the stored messages to the user, if any, as <message/> elements qualified by the 'jabber:client' namespace, starting with the oldest.

Neither, fair saint, if either thee dislike. Offline Storage

]]>

Private data stored by the server as specified in &xep0049; is represented in this format by including a <query/> element qualified by the 'jabber:iq:private' namespace as a child of the <user/> element. This <query/> element in turn contains all elements saved in private XML storage.

Hamlet ]]>

By &xep0054;, users can store vCards on the server. In this specification, vCards are child elements of the <user/> element, namely a <vCard/> element qualified by the 'vcard-temp' namespace.

Juliet Capulet ]]>

Exported data files are to be handled with care, since they contain data that users expect to be protected, in particular passwords. An exporting server SHOULD make sure that the generated file is not accessible to unauthorized persons, e.g. by enforcing strict file permissions.

This document requires no interaction with the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).

Until this specification advances to a status of Draft, its associated namespace shall be "http://www.xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0227.html#ns"; upon advancement of this specification, the ®ISTRAR; shall issue a permanent namespace in accordance with the process defined in Section 4 of &xep0053;.

]]>