Exciting news from Bluesky this week about atproto spaces (“private data”).
This blog article describes how to set up a private data user account. The account can then be used in various private data apps, for example the House Dice game.
Caveat, the new user accounts are simply test accounts provided by Bluesky. They should not be used to store sensitive information, and Bluesky may delete them at any time. Critically, do not depend on these accounts, they are for trial purposes only.
A private data user account is a special Bluesky test account that is configured for atproto spaces. For your new user account, head on over to https://bsky.network/account/
Once there, click on "Create Invite Code" to get your alpha Atmosphere account.
When the new Invite Code appears, click Copy, and then Sign Up.
After clicking Sign Up, the Atproto Spaces Alpha welcome screen appears. Choose a username.
You will then see your full username for the new account.
From there, click Next and enter the Invite Code, your email, and a password for the new username account.
After clicking Sign Up, your new account will appear.
To complete the registration, a final verification step for your email.
All good to go.
You can use the new account like you would a regular Bluesky account to create public records (e.g. posts), but it also has the unique capability of creating private records that only you can see, when used in certain apps.
The House Dice game has been updated to work with private data. When you play House Dice with a regular Bluesky account, the dice rolls are stored on your account as a public record.
However, when logging in to House Dice with a spaces-alpha account, the dice rolls are saved as private records.
When signing in to House Dice, you can see the game is requesting access to save private data to your new account.
Once authorized, the House Dice game will then show up on your new Atmosphere account page under Apps.
After a dice game is played, the result is stored to private data on your new account.
You can verify that the record was stored to private data by visiting PDSls and signing on with your new account username to see Spaces (non-public records).
Confirmation that the dice roll record was saved to your account as private data.
Note, the new spaces-alpha accounts are experimental in nature and intended for testing only, as described here.
Enjoy!