The NLnet foundation is calling for NGI Taler projects with a deadline of April 1st 2025 12:00 CEST (noon). Project proposal between 5k and 50k EUR are in scope.
Integrating GNU Taler with the Open Food Network aligns with our mission and values extremely well. But there is no open Ruby implementation yet. We can create a public library and integrate it in OFN for production use while strengthening the whole eco-system. So let’s flesh out the funding application. Below are the application questions. I added warning signs to all unanswered questions. We can remove them as we complete those.
Contact information
CoopCircuits
@Rachel will submit the application.
General project information
Proposal name
Taler payment for Ruby e-commerce including Open Food Network
Website / wiki
https://openfoodnetwork.org/
Abstract: Can you explain the whole project and its expected outcome(s).
(You have 1200 characters) 
Please be short and to the point in your answers; focus primarily on the what and how, not so much on the why. Add longer descriptions as attachments (see below). If English isn’t your first language, don’t worry — our reviewers don’t care about spelling errors, only about great ideas. We apologise for the inconvenience of having to submit in English. On the up side, you can be as technical as you need to be (but you don’t have to). Do stay concrete. Use plain text in your reply only, if you need any HTML to make your point please include this as attachment.
Develop an open-source Ruby library (gem) for Taler payment integration and add Taler payment method to the Open Food Network e-commerce platform.
The Open Food Network platform is used by community organisations and small enterprises to sell food and other local produce. Currently, customers can pay for their orders online with PayPal or Stripe. But we would like to add a new option to pay with GNU Taler. The API interaction with the Taler backend will be shared in a re-usable library for other e-commerce platforms written in Ruby.
Have you been involved with projects or organisations relevant to this project before? And if so, can you tell us a bit about your contributions?
(Optional) This can help us determine if you are the right person to undertake this effort. (max 2500 characters)
Part of our team are also members of the Open Food Network (OFN) development team. OFN has been working in the Ruby on Rails community for over ten years. All our products are open-source.
We contribute back to related projects. This included integrating PayPal and Stripe into the Open Food Network e-commerce app. We contributed to ActiveMerchant:
- SecurePayAU: Send order ID for payments with stored card by dacook · Pull Request #3979 · activemerchant/active_merchant · GitHub
- SecurePayAU: Allow custom request_timeout by dacook · Pull Request #5392 · activemerchant/active_merchant · GitHub
- SecurepayAU: New test for stored card by dacook · Pull Request #5398 · activemerchant/active_merchant · GitHub
We also created new Ruby gems for the community:
- rspec-sql | RubyGems.org | your community gem host
- GitHub - ceresfairfood/geokit-geocoder-mappify: A Geokit geocoder for mappify.io
And we’ve been successful in our NGI Sargasso grant for the Cooperative Agri-Data Portal.
Requested support
Requested Amount (in Euro)
47,520
Explain what the requested budget will be used for?
Does the project have other funding sources, both past and present?
(If you want, you can in addition attach a budget at the bottom of the form)
Explain costs for hardware, human labor (including rates used), travel cost to technical meetings, etc. (max 2500 characters, be concise)
CoopCircuits and other members of the OFN network around the world are recipients of licence fees for the use of the e-commerce platform. Each year, we dedicate a chunk of these fees to the development of new feature and overall maintenance.
Adding Taler payments to the OFN platform can be divided into two parts: a shared library and integrating the library into OFN. Development work is estimated as time to write the code. We then add overheads for project management, review, testing and maintenance.
Given we want to use this in production, we added cost related to managing feedback from user group.
Create a taler-payment library (gem):
- Study existing implementations (PHP, Python): 2 days
- Set up gem with automated test environment for Taler: 1 day
- Implement payments in Ruby including tests: 5 days
- GNU Taler backend URL
- GNU Taler backend API key
- App endpoint for fulfillment URL (order_id / token)
Use the Taler payment gateway in OFN:
- Shape and design UX and scope of implementation: 1 day
- Add enterprise page to add Taler as payment method: 3 days
- Add customer UX for Taler payments: 3 days
- Integrate Taler payment logic into existing payment system: 2 days
- Integrate Taler refunds into existing payment system: 2 days
Getting the gateway ready for production:
- Create a group of users happy to beta-test the platform with their close customers: 1 day
- Organise testing phases during development: 3 days
- Once the gateway is ready for production, launch with the same group of tester at first and increase the number of users until the gateway is available for everyone: 2 days
Documentation & Dissemination
- Ensure the ruby gem is fully documented: 1 day
- Communicate on the gem in related blog, forum and networks of the Ruby community: 2 days
- Present the project in relevant conferences in Europe: 2 days
Total: 30 days
Effective daily rate including all overheads (project management, meetings, testing): 1,584 EUR
Total budget needed: 47,520 EUR
Compare your own project with existing or historical efforts.
E.g. what is new, more thorough or otherwise different. (max 4000 characters, be concise)
Taler payments are available in Joomla, Magento and WooCommerce. There’s no (public/open) implementation in Ruby.
We want to add Taler payments to the Open Food Network platform. We process over 16,000 orders per month globally and our users need a cheaper way to process payments that is reliable and aligns with our values.
We will also publish a Ruby library on rubygems.org to enable other e-commerce software to adapt Taler more easily. The Open Food Network was originally built with the Spree e-commerce framework which is used by many online shops. Our implementation should be easily adaptable by Spree and its fork Solidus.
Sharing the Taler payment library will also enable us to share the maintenance work with our active community of developers. We have over 200 volunteer contributors to our main project. And once other projects start using the same library, we’ll have a joint interest in the maintenance.
What are significant technical challenges you expect to solve during the project, if any?
(optional but recommended, max 5000 characters)
The most obvious challenge is that GNU Taler isn’t used in production yet. The API may change and we may have to update our code later to take Taler payments to production. We won’t be able to complete delivery until we have a real bank to participate.
The other challenge is that our code base is over ten years old and relatively big. The code around payment methods hasn’t had any significant changes in 4 years. So we planned this work with a margin to address technical debt and unknown hurdles in this part.
Otherwise, the API integration to perform Taler payments seems simple. The customer doesn’t have to enter any payment details on our site and we don’t need to embed any additional Javascript. The payment is handled by the existing app or browser extension with the existing backend.
Describe the ecosystem of the project, and how you will engage with relevant actors and promote the outcomes?
E.g. which actors will you involve? Who should run or deploy your solution to make it a success? (max 2500 characters, be concise)
CoopCircuits is part of the global Open Food Network, which is a group of not-for-profit organisations. We have a team of paid full-stack engineers working on the Open Food Network platform. We also attract many volunteer contributions from the open-source community. We benefit from the contributions and provide code reviews and learning experiences in exchange. Our visibility in the Ruby on Rails community will help to promote the new Taler payments gem (library).
On the other side, we have customer support, consulting and research teams in several countries to promote a new payment option to all kind of small to medium food enterprises. Local food hubs and co-ops often rely on volunteer work and don’t have the money to pay for high transaction fees. The next best alternative is to reconcile bank transfers which is very labour-intensive.
