11 ms·

iOS app

186 points by Arathorn 10y ago

deleted 10y ago
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jrowley 10y ago
Looks nice, and glad to see it's open source and that I can run it on my own server :) A very crowded space but having that option is great. I wonder how integration with phabricator would work/look like.
Arathorn 10y ago
We just showed off the first official release of the Vector clients for Matrix.org at the Decentralised Web Summit (http://decentralizedweb.net http://decentralizedweb.net) - it seems to have gone down quite well, and even attracted a few new faces :D https://matrix.org/_matrix/media/v1/thumbnail/matrix.org/xhDiiENbEJiDJVJQXZlDqbEA?width=800&height=600 https://matrix.org/_matrix/media/v1/thumbnail/matrix.org/xhD...
- mark_l_watson 10y ago
  I was only at the first six hours of the Decentralized Web Summit and I missed your demo. Tim Berners Lee was promoting solid github.com/solid as an open framework. I have just started looking at Solid and I would appreciate your comparison of Matrix and Solid.
  - Arathorn 10y ago
    Solid seems to have very similar goals to Matrix, but seems to be a bit more abstract at this point. I had some brief conversations with Tim at the summit about how to collaborate, and as you can see he's been using Vector to participate in the conference chat. I'm sure that we'll get the two to bridge or converge in future!
unicornporn 10y ago
I've been using Vector for Android the last days and I must say I am VERY impressed. Both the vector.im web interface and the smartphone apps are looking polished at a level that I'm very unused to when it comes to open source projects. I must say though that people are becoming more and more unfamiliar with decentralization. Naming the standard one thing (Matrix) and the main phone app another (Vector) is IMHO a move that only a technologist would come up with. The logic might seem crystal clear to all you working on the project. But if you want traction (hell, you could actually be a serious alternative to Slack!) you should've register something like matrix.im and named the app Matrix.
- amandine 10y ago
  Except Vector and Matrix are two different things :) Matrix wants as many apps built upon it as possible, Vector is just leveraging the power of Matrix to provide good collaboration services
  - unicornporn 10y ago
    Ah, after actually reading, and not only using, I understand. So, will the end user looking for a chat and collaboration tool (or alternative to Slack or IRC) only see the Vector "brand" and not Matrix?
    - amandine 10y ago
      Yes, and the idea is to have a lot of "Matrix powered" apps out there like Vector
      - unicornporn 10y ago
        Excellent idea.
- Perceptes 10y ago
  Matrix is the protocol that Vector uses. Matrix itself is being marketed to developers to build their apps using it. Vector is aimed at end users who want a chat system, and they don't really have to know or care what Matrix is. A good analogy is Matrix : Vector :: Email : Gmail
slimsag 10y ago
I'm not trying to be rude by saying this, but these names "Vector" and "Matrix" are far from Google-able, and sometimes (esp. in game development, and other scientific fields I'm sure) not even clear in person-to-person discussion.
- Arathorn 10y ago
  fair point. One can always spell out the domains to differentiate though - "Vector dot IM" and "Matrix dot org" :)
  - giancarlostoro 10y ago
    Usually I would type in "Vector IM" or another word I associate with what I'm looking for if I forgot the domain. Just like "GoLang" and "DLang" when I google for those languages. Edit: Come to think of it I'm surprised Google doesn't offer alternate search suggestions in "Web" searches as they do in "Google Images" it would make searching the web more interesting. I think all major search engines should give that approach a try. I know Google shows options to enhance your Google Images searching.
    - philtar 10y ago
      They do. Google then scroll to the bottom.
      - giancarlostoro 10y ago
        I google'd "Go" and didn't see what you meant. When I searched "Swing" I found it. I think that should be either on the side at the top somewhere, or before results if possible.
    - nialv7 10y ago
      And Google Trend already let you differentiate between Go the game and Go programming language (just input the terms and it will show those options). I hope they will offer the same on their web search
cshimmin 10y ago
Nobody has said the word "slack" yet... but am I interpreting this correctly? An open source clone of slack? If so, it's very interesting. I wonder if they are taking any steps towards solving the "fragmentation" issue that slack teams seem to cause. I have a few contacts that are shared between 2-3 different slack teams and I can never remember where to find my PM conversations. Edit: okay someone else did say "slack", should have refreshed the page before posting :)
- Arathorn 10y ago
  Vector runs on top of the Matrix protocol (matrix.org), which is built precisely to fix fragmentation - hence the name Matrix :) Anyone within the Matrix ecosystem can talk to anyone else, whether they're using Vector, another Matrix client (http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html), or a bridged system like Slack, IRC, XMPP, etc. We want to open up all those silos to talk to one another.
- amandine 10y ago
  Vector does address the same market as Slack, with similar feature set but also leveraging Matrix to bridge to other systems like Slack, and IRC, and others soon. And yes Vector allows you to be part of several teams without switching between them. [disclaimer: I'm from Vector team]
  - cshimmin 10y ago
    Thanks for the reply! To clarify, you mean to say that a single user-account can be the exact same entity on multiple teams? And so point-to-point communication is not affected by team boundaries? What about server boundaries? Can they be federated somehow? Sorry if you are trying to answer this with your point about Matrix; I'm not familiar with it. Edit: ah! Arathorn answered my question about federation. This is super cool stuff!
    - amandine 10y ago
      Yes basically the concept of closed teams doesn't exist in Vector: you are a member of different chatrooms, public or private, with other people, each having its own focus, no matter what is the project scope or the topic.
SamWhited 10y ago
I still don't understand why Matrix was made when XMPP is already a thing; if you're not happy with the existing standard participate in the process, don't just make up a new one. https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/
- xena 10y ago
  https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differen... This explains why
- Arathorn 10y ago
  They have completely different architectures and philosophies. Matrix is a decentralised conversation database - it's all about synchronising communication history between the different silos. It has a single monolithic spec, for better or worse, so you know that if your client and server supports the Matrix v0.1.0 spec, they will work with all the features available for the particular use case (e.g. mobile voip). XMPP instead is federated messaging and presence (and a whole bunch of stuff on top). It's passing stanzas between servers rather than synchronising historical stanzas between servers. The specs are highly modular and extensible and built out of XEPs. It's just a totally different way of approaching the problem of open communications. You could make the comparison that XMPP is a bit like SMTP, and Matrix is a bit like NNTP (Usenet). They both fulfil the same end goal - letting folks communicate openly over the internet. But they have totally different designs and there's room on the 'net for both. After all, you can just bridge XMPP to Matrix and everyone wins! :)
- btown 10y ago
  They do address this: https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differen... There's a larger narrative, I think, about how standardization bodies that are focused on backwards-compatibility can move more slowly than a newly-built ecosystem. While the web has huge commercial players dedicated to making it a first-class experience in an interoperable way, it's unclear that XMPP has the same impetus to evolve. Google Wave could have saved XMPP, but look how that turned out. I think it's very reasonable for Matrix to unfetter themselves from XMPP politics in a world where Slack the Quadricorn is the gold standard.
thedangler 10y ago
Integration's? Do you have to build an integration through the matrix api? No real detail on the page about it.
- Arathorn 10y ago
  Right now you have to run your own integration from the list of Application Services at http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html, or use one of the existing ones which someone's running out on Matrix. In the near future Vector will provide self-service hosted integrations for those who don't want to run their own.
phantom_oracle 10y ago
This may be helpful to other people, as I myself was a bit confused in the beginning. Vector.im is a client to the protocol called "matrix.org". This is equivalent to using XChat(client) on the IRC protocol. In this case, matrix.org also runs their own servers (but you can host your own), so it is like IRC protocol (matrix protocol) + Freenode (matrix server).
- amandine 10y ago
  good summary :)
- unicornporn 10y ago
  One big difference though is that the users on one server could communicate with users on another server. In the world of IRC that would mean that users from Freenode and EFnet could communicate with each other in the same channel. Pretty awesome.
  - anewhnaccount 10y ago
    IRC has federation.
    - amandine 10y ago
      So does Matrix :)
      - Bromskloss 10y ago
        That's what unicornporn implied.
    - Arathorn 10y ago
      IRC's federation is closed - you can't just spin up a new server and join Freenode unless you work for them. Matrix's federation is open (like email, or XMPP) - anyone can spin up a server and own their own conversations :)
  - 10y ago
jalami 10y ago
Matrix and vector look more interesting by the week. I would really like to see the Android port on F-droid. I haven't done a tonne of research, but I believe Vector uses Google Play Services, specifically GCM. This makes it impossible for me to use on my GAPPS-less phone. It also bars it from F-droid.
- amandine 10y ago
  Yes the Vector Android app uses GCM, but it's opensource so you might be able to tweak it so that it works on F-droid? Sorry I don't know much about the differences there...
  - dlmetcalf 10y ago
    Leaving people no option but to use Google's infrastructure (if they want to participate with anything better than a browser) seems an ENORMOUS gap, given the rest of the project's goals. If you want to use it on mobile, it IS still centralised around Play Store and GCM (where Google can collect all your metadata). You can't even install the Matrix mobile app on open source Android phone that doesn't have all the Google bloatware installed (which you can't do on decent OS's like Copperhead yet while keeping a signed & verified boot loader). You've done some great work, so I don't want to be too critical (I don't have time to implement the fix for a start!) - but this is almost like how Signal claims to be open source, but you can't ACTUALLY USE the iOS version, because GPL is incompatible with Apple Store. You claim to be open source and decentralised, but you can't actually use it on an open source and decentralised platform. So I kinda don't see the point.
    - aviraldg 10y ago
      Have you actually tried using it on a phone with no Google Play Services? I'm involved with the project and I remember someone reporting it works just fine. Vector for Android falls back to polling if GCM isn't supported/working afaik.
      - Arathorn 10y ago
jbk 10y ago
I'm curious, how does this compare to open source slack-clones like Mattermost?
- trextrex 10y ago
  In terms of architecture, it's entirely different. Rather than being a centralized service (like mattermost), Matrix is a decentralized protocol that can be federated across servers. And vector.im is just one (web) interface for using this protocol. It just happens that it can be used for similar things that Slack can. It's more like IRC (but distributed/federated)
- amandine 10y ago
  With Vector you have the choice between using the hosted version of Vector or host it yourself. And being built on the Matrix (http://matrix.org http://matrix.org) standard, it's a completely distributed architecture: run your own server and own your own data! Like any other Matrix compliant app, Vector supports out of the box all the bridges and integrations the community contributes to the Matrix ecosystem. So today it bridges to Slack and IRC, soon Mattermost, Rocketchat, Skype, Lync... And Github, Jira, Jenkins for the integration side, with much more to come, including Slack webhooks. On the UX side of things, Vector doesn't force you to create an account per team like Slack does and allows the creation of public chat rooms which can be referenced in a directory. Rooms can be invite-only or just "hidden" (anyone with the link can access) or fully public (anyone can access). Also every message is indexed and has a permalink to it, so easy to share information, especially given people can access rooms as guests (if the room allows), no need to create an account. In terms of Real Soon Now stuff: - End to end encryption will be landing in a couple of weeks - Vector web and Android support voice and video conferences via WebRTC (it needs additional polish so consider it as beta, but it's here) - Proper nice UI to provision the bridges and the integrations in the room (couple of weeks) And I feel like I'm missing stuff... But that's probably the main bits
  - cyphar 10y ago
    > In terms of Real Soon Now stuff: - End to end encryption will be landing in a couple of weeks Will this be based on Axolotl? If so, and you want to avoid the Signal problem of there being a log of messages being passed between users, how are you dealing with that? Or is the idea that to make that type of security guarantee you have to self-host conversations? If so, surely there's still a log of messages being sent there. Maybe you could employ a rubberhose-like setup where you send fake messages that mask the real ones?
briankwest 10y ago
You can watch Matthew from the Matrix/Vector project here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF93l0DbAg0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF93l0DbAg0 We did this call yesterday with them, the Video element uses FreeSWITCH Video MCU. You should check it out. Its very interesting. /b
deleted 10y ago
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em3rgent0rdr 10y ago
PRIVACY CONCERN: I had to disable Privacy Badger simply to create my account. When I clicked the link in my email for verification, it asks me to prove that I'm not a robot, but didn't have anything for me to click or do to prove that. Only after disabling privacy badger would it produce a simple checkbox which I clicked, thus proving I'm not a robot. Designers: Could you please provide an alternate method of human-verification if the user has enabled something like privacy badger?
- Arathorn 10y ago
  Sure - sorry about this; I guess there's something in the google reCAPTCHA stuff which triggers privacy badger. We'll investigate.
  - dlmetcalf 10y ago
    It's great to see how open you are to community feedback. Hats off for your responsiveness!
rglullis 10y ago
As someone who has self hosted my own XMPP server before and still cries over the move taken by Google and Facebook with their messengers, can someone from the Matrix people explain what is so fundamentally different from the protocol, that it couldn't be done in XMPP? Please don't say "it is XML based". I know the situation with the clients is XMPP-land is appalling, but it seems to me that if Matrix does get any kind of traction, it will face the exact same kind of problems.
- asp2insp 10y ago
  (not from the team) The matrix.org FAQ has a great overview of the protocol's strengths vs XMPP, IRC, etc: http://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp http://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differenc... (and it doesn't mention XML at all!)
myaccountzz 10y ago
Does it have encryption already? Because at top it says so, but at the bottom it says not yet. >Soon, protect your conversation with state of the art end-to-end encryption using Matrix's Olm cryptographic ratchet.
- amandine 10y ago
  Not yet, couple of weeks away though
  - myaccountzz 10y ago
    Thanks for letting us know.
  - Arathorn 10y ago
    It's actually landed on the develop branch, but we're still testing. The bit at the top of the webpage anticipates it merging to master :)
xfalcox 10y ago
Is there some way to connect to this using pidgin on Linux?
- Arathorn 10y ago
  there's a very basic and experimental pidgin plugin at https://github.com/matrix-org/purple-matrix https://github.com/matrix-org/purple-matrix, but the impedance mismatch between purple2 and matrix is pretty bad (eg limited support for synchronised conversation history). It needs more features before it can be used in anger - patches welcome ;)
pjtr 10y ago
Looks very interesting, but the site is still lacking some important information (or not very clear) from an end-user perspective. Why is there no description of the features? Don't tell me "just try it". There are so many chat clients out there I can't try all of them. But I'm always on the look out for a chat client that also supports group voice chat and group screen sharing. The page says "VoIP", but with no explanation or details at all. The demo doesn't seem to contain that. Does it exist? Screensharing is not mentioned at all. Does it exist? Does this run on Windows / OSX / Linux? Neither is mentioned anywhere. Maybe even more important would be an end-user oriented site for the Matrix server. Is this a thing? The matrix.org site is very confusing as it has no clear focus. It's all a mix between detail-free overview of the overall idea and low level protocol specification. Where is the end-user friendly page about the Matrix server? What features does it have and how do I set it up? Where is the "tutorial" / blog post about how to successfully setup my own server and install a client in three easy steps to have a full team communication solution (group-text, -voice and -screensharing)? One thing I really like about Slack is they have great documentation and great customer support. Matrix and Vector may be great, unfortunately it's too difficult to find out.
- Arathorn 10y ago
  So far the site is just a quick one-page overview - we haven't had a chance to flesh out any of the detail yet at all; sorry about that :) To answer the questions: * 1:1 VoIP is supported on WebRTC on the web version, Android, and iOS coming very shortly. On Web you hit the call buttons on the bottom right; on Android it's currently hidden behind the top-left menu. * Multiway VoIP is very beta, but supported on the web version. Hit the call buttons when in a room. * Screensharing is even more beta, but happens to be there as an undocumented easter egg on Web. Currently it only works if you're running on Chrome with the --enable-usermedia-screen-capturing commandline option, and shift-click on the video call button. Obviously this isn't intended remotely for serious use yet, but we're working on it. * The three platforms supported are Web/iOS/Android. You can of course run the Web client fine on Windows/OSX/Linux. If you want a different native client, go experiment with the other options on http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html * The page you failed to find for the Synapse server is probably the read me at https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse. Agreed we need to make this clearer, and provide much better simple overviews and tutorials for getting up and running. * Agreed that Slack have amazing documentation - it's something we desperately need to do better at. I'd like to think our "customer support" isn't too bad, though; good luck in getting one of Slack's co-founders answering your feedback on HN ;D
dlmetcalf 10y ago
Am I missing something here? What license is the Matrix Specification itself under? (I know most of the implementations themselves are ASLv2). It seems really unclear from the site & repo: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc, https://matrix.org/docs/spec/ https://matrix.org/docs/spec/ (apart from being copyright to Matrix.org) Is this yet to be clarified? (Maybe the Google vs. Oracle case makes it slightly less relevant, but needs to be clarified). What stops Matrix getting everyone aboard, then releasing new CLOSED versions of the major server and clients with a new spec (as the protocol formerly known as Axltl did), and carrying the critical mass of user base with them? Sure, the implementations are ASLv2, so in theory the community could fork, but in practice that doesn't always work. Is there going to be incentive to keep it open? (Signal was an 'open' implementation and spec too, but that didn't work out as people expected, even though OWS are non-profit). Thanks.
- dlmetcalf 10y ago
  I know Olm is open: "The Olm specification (this document) is hereby placed in the public domain.", https://matrix.org/docs/spec/olm.html https://matrix.org/docs/spec/olm.html). Is the Matrix Spec public domain too?
- Arathorn 10y ago
  This is a genuinely accidental omission - the spec is either PD, a CC variant or ASLv2. Will work out which and post it.
  - dlmetcalf 10y ago
    Thanks Arathorn. Matthew's confirmed that to me also. I expected that'd be the case.
vbezhenar 10y ago
Matrix is an extremely promising project. It has everything I'm expecting from IM platform so far: it's very open; it's decentralized (I can host my own server and it'll talk to others); it's centralized (one server for many clients); it's modern (HTTP, JSON, REST); it supports push; it synchronises a single history between all clients. It has VoIP, file transfers. There are numerous clients and few are surprisingly mature. Honestly, it's the best protocol out there. I don't know any other protocol with all those features. I really hope, that Matrix will be the IM of our future, it's good enough for that, in contrast to every other popular IM platform. I used vector.im as a web interface, and it just works. I'll try to deploy Matrix as our tiny company internal communication tool. Currently we use a mix of e-mail, skype, whatsapp, telegram, and it just not as good as it could be. I can't force my friends to move to other IM, but I can influence my colleagues, and, hopefully, it'll be the trend. What Matrix really need is some marketing. It's so awesome, I couldn't believe, that I'm so rarely read news about it. Very few people know what it is, and that's a sad situation.
G43nm45ji 10y ago
I Just got weirdly excited by this. I had heard of it before but never really though about what I could do with it. But then I'm never really sure if I understand it completely yet. If i just want to set up a server that me and my friends would use. I can just make a server. they would register on it and we would be good to go? I don't have to join the federation if I don't want to? I understand the advantages of doing so though. Also, how does the vector apps go on battery use and all that. comparable to other messaging apps?
- amandine 10y ago
  Precisely: just setup the server and off you go, you don't have to federate, although as you say that would be missing part of the fun ;) The Vector app on Android (using GCM) has pretty good perf battery consumption-wise. Unsure how it compares with other apps but we haven't had any particular complaints about it.
Bombthecat 10y ago
Does it have push on iPhone and Android?
- aviraldg 10y ago
  Yes.

186 points by Arathorn 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

Looks nice, and glad to see it's open source and that I can run it on my own server :) A very crowded space but having that option is great. I wonder how integration with phabricator would work/look like.

Arathorn 10y ago

We just showed off the first official release of the Vector clients for Matrix.org at the Decentralised Web Summit (http://decentralizedweb.net http://decentralizedweb.net) - it seems to have gone down quite well, and even attracted a few new faces :D https://matrix.org/_matrix/media/v1/thumbnail/matrix.org/xhDiiENbEJiDJVJQXZlDqbEA?width=800&height=600 https://matrix.org/_matrix/media/v1/thumbnail/matrix.org/xhD...

mark_l_watson 10y ago
I was only at the first six hours of the Decentralized Web Summit and I missed your demo. Tim Berners Lee was promoting solid github.com/solid as an open framework. I have just started looking at Solid and I would appreciate your comparison of Matrix and Solid.
- Arathorn 10y ago
  Solid seems to have very similar goals to Matrix, but seems to be a bit more abstract at this point. I had some brief conversations with Tim at the summit about how to collaborate, and as you can see he's been using Vector to participate in the conference chat. I'm sure that we'll get the two to bridge or converge in future!

unicornporn 10y ago

I've been using Vector for Android the last days and I must say I am VERY impressed. Both the vector.im web interface and the smartphone apps are looking polished at a level that I'm very unused to when it comes to open source projects. I must say though that people are becoming more and more unfamiliar with decentralization. Naming the standard one thing (Matrix) and the main phone app another (Vector) is IMHO a move that only a technologist would come up with. The logic might seem crystal clear to all you working on the project. But if you want traction (hell, you could actually be a serious alternative to Slack!) you should've register something like matrix.im and named the app Matrix.

amandine 10y ago
Except Vector and Matrix are two different things :) Matrix wants as many apps built upon it as possible, Vector is just leveraging the power of Matrix to provide good collaboration services
- unicornporn 10y ago
  Ah, after actually reading, and not only using, I understand. So, will the end user looking for a chat and collaboration tool (or alternative to Slack or IRC) only see the Vector "brand" and not Matrix?
  - amandine 10y ago
    Yes, and the idea is to have a lot of "Matrix powered" apps out there like Vector
    - unicornporn 10y ago
      Excellent idea.
Perceptes 10y ago
Matrix is the protocol that Vector uses. Matrix itself is being marketed to developers to build their apps using it. Vector is aimed at end users who want a chat system, and they don't really have to know or care what Matrix is. A good analogy is Matrix : Vector :: Email : Gmail

slimsag 10y ago

I'm not trying to be rude by saying this, but these names "Vector" and "Matrix" are far from Google-able, and sometimes (esp. in game development, and other scientific fields I'm sure) not even clear in person-to-person discussion.

Arathorn 10y ago
fair point. One can always spell out the domains to differentiate though - "Vector dot IM" and "Matrix dot org" :)
- giancarlostoro 10y ago
  Usually I would type in "Vector IM" or another word I associate with what I'm looking for if I forgot the domain. Just like "GoLang" and "DLang" when I google for those languages. Edit: Come to think of it I'm surprised Google doesn't offer alternate search suggestions in "Web" searches as they do in "Google Images" it would make searching the web more interesting. I think all major search engines should give that approach a try. I know Google shows options to enhance your Google Images searching.
  - philtar 10y ago
    They do. Google then scroll to the bottom.
    - giancarlostoro 10y ago
      I google'd "Go" and didn't see what you meant. When I searched "Swing" I found it. I think that should be either on the side at the top somewhere, or before results if possible.
  - nialv7 10y ago
    And Google Trend already let you differentiate between Go the game and Go programming language (just input the terms and it will show those options). I hope they will offer the same on their web search

cshimmin 10y ago

Nobody has said the word "slack" yet... but am I interpreting this correctly? An open source clone of slack? If so, it's very interesting. I wonder if they are taking any steps towards solving the "fragmentation" issue that slack teams seem to cause. I have a few contacts that are shared between 2-3 different slack teams and I can never remember where to find my PM conversations. Edit: okay someone else did say "slack", should have refreshed the page before posting :)

Arathorn 10y ago
Vector runs on top of the Matrix protocol (matrix.org), which is built precisely to fix fragmentation - hence the name Matrix :) Anyone within the Matrix ecosystem can talk to anyone else, whether they're using Vector, another Matrix client (http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html), or a bridged system like Slack, IRC, XMPP, etc. We want to open up all those silos to talk to one another.
amandine 10y ago
Vector does address the same market as Slack, with similar feature set but also leveraging Matrix to bridge to other systems like Slack, and IRC, and others soon. And yes Vector allows you to be part of several teams without switching between them. [disclaimer: I'm from Vector team]
- cshimmin 10y ago
  Thanks for the reply! To clarify, you mean to say that a single user-account can be the exact same entity on multiple teams? And so point-to-point communication is not affected by team boundaries? What about server boundaries? Can they be federated somehow? Sorry if you are trying to answer this with your point about Matrix; I'm not familiar with it. Edit: ah! Arathorn answered my question about federation. This is super cool stuff!
  - amandine 10y ago
    Yes basically the concept of closed teams doesn't exist in Vector: you are a member of different chatrooms, public or private, with other people, each having its own focus, no matter what is the project scope or the topic.

SamWhited 10y ago

I still don't understand why Matrix was made when XMPP is already a thing; if you're not happy with the existing standard participate in the process, don't just make up a new one. https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/

xena 10y ago
https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differen... This explains why
Arathorn 10y ago
They have completely different architectures and philosophies. Matrix is a decentralised conversation database - it's all about synchronising communication history between the different silos. It has a single monolithic spec, for better or worse, so you know that if your client and server supports the Matrix v0.1.0 spec, they will work with all the features available for the particular use case (e.g. mobile voip). XMPP instead is federated messaging and presence (and a whole bunch of stuff on top). It's passing stanzas between servers rather than synchronising historical stanzas between servers. The specs are highly modular and extensible and built out of XEPs. It's just a totally different way of approaching the problem of open communications. You could make the comparison that XMPP is a bit like SMTP, and Matrix is a bit like NNTP (Usenet). They both fulfil the same end goal - letting folks communicate openly over the internet. But they have totally different designs and there's room on the 'net for both. After all, you can just bridge XMPP to Matrix and everyone wins! :)
btown 10y ago
They do address this: https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp https://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differen... There's a larger narrative, I think, about how standardization bodies that are focused on backwards-compatibility can move more slowly than a newly-built ecosystem. While the web has huge commercial players dedicated to making it a first-class experience in an interoperable way, it's unclear that XMPP has the same impetus to evolve. Google Wave could have saved XMPP, but look how that turned out. I think it's very reasonable for Matrix to unfetter themselves from XMPP politics in a world where Slack the Quadricorn is the gold standard.

thedangler 10y ago

Integration's? Do you have to build an integration through the matrix api? No real detail on the page about it.

Arathorn 10y ago
Right now you have to run your own integration from the list of Application Services at http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html, or use one of the existing ones which someone's running out on Matrix. In the near future Vector will provide self-service hosted integrations for those who don't want to run their own.

phantom_oracle 10y ago

This may be helpful to other people, as I myself was a bit confused in the beginning. Vector.im is a client to the protocol called "matrix.org". This is equivalent to using XChat(client) on the IRC protocol. In this case, matrix.org also runs their own servers (but you can host your own), so it is like IRC protocol (matrix protocol) + Freenode (matrix server).

amandine 10y ago
good summary :)
unicornporn 10y ago
One big difference though is that the users on one server could communicate with users on another server. In the world of IRC that would mean that users from Freenode and EFnet could communicate with each other in the same channel. Pretty awesome.
- anewhnaccount 10y ago
  IRC has federation.
  - amandine 10y ago
    So does Matrix :)
    - Bromskloss 10y ago
      That's what unicornporn implied.
  - Arathorn 10y ago
    IRC's federation is closed - you can't just spin up a new server and join Freenode unless you work for them. Matrix's federation is open (like email, or XMPP) - anyone can spin up a server and own their own conversations :)
- 10y ago

jalami 10y ago

Matrix and vector look more interesting by the week. I would really like to see the Android port on F-droid. I haven't done a tonne of research, but I believe Vector uses Google Play Services, specifically GCM. This makes it impossible for me to use on my GAPPS-less phone. It also bars it from F-droid.

amandine 10y ago
Yes the Vector Android app uses GCM, but it's opensource so you might be able to tweak it so that it works on F-droid? Sorry I don't know much about the differences there...
- dlmetcalf 10y ago
  Leaving people no option but to use Google's infrastructure (if they want to participate with anything better than a browser) seems an ENORMOUS gap, given the rest of the project's goals. If you want to use it on mobile, it IS still centralised around Play Store and GCM (where Google can collect all your metadata). You can't even install the Matrix mobile app on open source Android phone that doesn't have all the Google bloatware installed (which you can't do on decent OS's like Copperhead yet while keeping a signed & verified boot loader). You've done some great work, so I don't want to be too critical (I don't have time to implement the fix for a start!) - but this is almost like how Signal claims to be open source, but you can't ACTUALLY USE the iOS version, because GPL is incompatible with Apple Store. You claim to be open source and decentralised, but you can't actually use it on an open source and decentralised platform. So I kinda don't see the point.
  - aviraldg 10y ago
    Have you actually tried using it on a phone with no Google Play Services? I'm involved with the project and I remember someone reporting it works just fine. Vector for Android falls back to polling if GCM isn't supported/working afaik.
    - Arathorn 10y ago

jbk 10y ago

I'm curious, how does this compare to open source slack-clones like Mattermost?

trextrex 10y ago
In terms of architecture, it's entirely different. Rather than being a centralized service (like mattermost), Matrix is a decentralized protocol that can be federated across servers. And vector.im is just one (web) interface for using this protocol. It just happens that it can be used for similar things that Slack can. It's more like IRC (but distributed/federated)
amandine 10y ago
With Vector you have the choice between using the hosted version of Vector or host it yourself. And being built on the Matrix (http://matrix.org http://matrix.org) standard, it's a completely distributed architecture: run your own server and own your own data! Like any other Matrix compliant app, Vector supports out of the box all the bridges and integrations the community contributes to the Matrix ecosystem. So today it bridges to Slack and IRC, soon Mattermost, Rocketchat, Skype, Lync... And Github, Jira, Jenkins for the integration side, with much more to come, including Slack webhooks. On the UX side of things, Vector doesn't force you to create an account per team like Slack does and allows the creation of public chat rooms which can be referenced in a directory. Rooms can be invite-only or just "hidden" (anyone with the link can access) or fully public (anyone can access). Also every message is indexed and has a permalink to it, so easy to share information, especially given people can access rooms as guests (if the room allows), no need to create an account. In terms of Real Soon Now stuff: - End to end encryption will be landing in a couple of weeks - Vector web and Android support voice and video conferences via WebRTC (it needs additional polish so consider it as beta, but it's here) - Proper nice UI to provision the bridges and the integrations in the room (couple of weeks) And I feel like I'm missing stuff... But that's probably the main bits
- cyphar 10y ago
  > In terms of Real Soon Now stuff: - End to end encryption will be landing in a couple of weeks Will this be based on Axolotl? If so, and you want to avoid the Signal problem of there being a log of messages being passed between users, how are you dealing with that? Or is the idea that to make that type of security guarantee you have to self-host conversations? If so, surely there's still a log of messages being sent there. Maybe you could employ a rubberhose-like setup where you send fake messages that mask the real ones?

briankwest 10y ago

You can watch Matthew from the Matrix/Vector project here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF93l0DbAg0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF93l0DbAg0 We did this call yesterday with them, the Video element uses FreeSWITCH Video MCU. You should check it out. Its very interesting. /b

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

em3rgent0rdr 10y ago

PRIVACY CONCERN: I had to disable Privacy Badger simply to create my account. When I clicked the link in my email for verification, it asks me to prove that I'm not a robot, but didn't have anything for me to click or do to prove that. Only after disabling privacy badger would it produce a simple checkbox which I clicked, thus proving I'm not a robot. Designers: Could you please provide an alternate method of human-verification if the user has enabled something like privacy badger?

Arathorn 10y ago
Sure - sorry about this; I guess there's something in the google reCAPTCHA stuff which triggers privacy badger. We'll investigate.
- dlmetcalf 10y ago
  It's great to see how open you are to community feedback. Hats off for your responsiveness!

rglullis 10y ago

As someone who has self hosted my own XMPP server before and still cries over the move taken by Google and Facebook with their messengers, can someone from the Matrix people explain what is so fundamentally different from the protocol, that it couldn't be done in XMPP? Please don't say "it is XML based". I know the situation with the clients is XMPP-land is appalling, but it seems to me that if Matrix does get any kind of traction, it will face the exact same kind of problems.

asp2insp 10y ago
(not from the team) The matrix.org FAQ has a great overview of the protocol's strengths vs XMPP, IRC, etc: http://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-difference-between-matrix-and-xmpp http://matrix.org/docs/guides/faq.html#what-is-the-differenc... (and it doesn't mention XML at all!)

myaccountzz 10y ago

Does it have encryption already? Because at top it says so, but at the bottom it says not yet. >Soon, protect your conversation with state of the art end-to-end encryption using Matrix's Olm cryptographic ratchet.

amandine 10y ago
Not yet, couple of weeks away though
- myaccountzz 10y ago
  Thanks for letting us know.
- Arathorn 10y ago
  It's actually landed on the develop branch, but we're still testing. The bit at the top of the webpage anticipates it merging to master :)

xfalcox 10y ago

Is there some way to connect to this using pidgin on Linux?

Arathorn 10y ago
there's a very basic and experimental pidgin plugin at https://github.com/matrix-org/purple-matrix https://github.com/matrix-org/purple-matrix, but the impedance mismatch between purple2 and matrix is pretty bad (eg limited support for synchronised conversation history). It needs more features before it can be used in anger - patches welcome ;)

pjtr 10y ago

Looks very interesting, but the site is still lacking some important information (or not very clear) from an end-user perspective. Why is there no description of the features? Don't tell me "just try it". There are so many chat clients out there I can't try all of them. But I'm always on the look out for a chat client that also supports group voice chat and group screen sharing. The page says "VoIP", but with no explanation or details at all. The demo doesn't seem to contain that. Does it exist? Screensharing is not mentioned at all. Does it exist? Does this run on Windows / OSX / Linux? Neither is mentioned anywhere. Maybe even more important would be an end-user oriented site for the Matrix server. Is this a thing? The matrix.org site is very confusing as it has no clear focus. It's all a mix between detail-free overview of the overall idea and low level protocol specification. Where is the end-user friendly page about the Matrix server? What features does it have and how do I set it up? Where is the "tutorial" / blog post about how to successfully setup my own server and install a client in three easy steps to have a full team communication solution (group-text, -voice and -screensharing)? One thing I really like about Slack is they have great documentation and great customer support. Matrix and Vector may be great, unfortunately it's too difficult to find out.

Arathorn 10y ago
So far the site is just a quick one-page overview - we haven't had a chance to flesh out any of the detail yet at all; sorry about that :) To answer the questions: * 1:1 VoIP is supported on WebRTC on the web version, Android, and iOS coming very shortly. On Web you hit the call buttons on the bottom right; on Android it's currently hidden behind the top-left menu. * Multiway VoIP is very beta, but supported on the web version. Hit the call buttons when in a room. * Screensharing is even more beta, but happens to be there as an undocumented easter egg on Web. Currently it only works if you're running on Chrome with the --enable-usermedia-screen-capturing commandline option, and shift-click on the video call button. Obviously this isn't intended remotely for serious use yet, but we're working on it. * The three platforms supported are Web/iOS/Android. You can of course run the Web client fine on Windows/OSX/Linux. If you want a different native client, go experiment with the other options on http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html http://matrix.org/docs/projects/try-matrix-now.html * The page you failed to find for the Synapse server is probably the read me at https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse. Agreed we need to make this clearer, and provide much better simple overviews and tutorials for getting up and running. * Agreed that Slack have amazing documentation - it's something we desperately need to do better at. I'd like to think our "customer support" isn't too bad, though; good luck in getting one of Slack's co-founders answering your feedback on HN ;D

dlmetcalf 10y ago

Am I missing something here? What license is the Matrix Specification itself under? (I know most of the implementations themselves are ASLv2). It seems really unclear from the site & repo: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc, https://matrix.org/docs/spec/ https://matrix.org/docs/spec/ (apart from being copyright to Matrix.org) Is this yet to be clarified? (Maybe the Google vs. Oracle case makes it slightly less relevant, but needs to be clarified). What stops Matrix getting everyone aboard, then releasing new CLOSED versions of the major server and clients with a new spec (as the protocol formerly known as Axltl did), and carrying the critical mass of user base with them? Sure, the implementations are ASLv2, so in theory the community could fork, but in practice that doesn't always work. Is there going to be incentive to keep it open? (Signal was an 'open' implementation and spec too, but that didn't work out as people expected, even though OWS are non-profit). Thanks.

dlmetcalf 10y ago
I know Olm is open: "The Olm specification (this document) is hereby placed in the public domain.", https://matrix.org/docs/spec/olm.html https://matrix.org/docs/spec/olm.html). Is the Matrix Spec public domain too?
Arathorn 10y ago
This is a genuinely accidental omission - the spec is either PD, a CC variant or ASLv2. Will work out which and post it.
- dlmetcalf 10y ago
  Thanks Arathorn. Matthew's confirmed that to me also. I expected that'd be the case.

vbezhenar 10y ago

Matrix is an extremely promising project. It has everything I'm expecting from IM platform so far: it's very open; it's decentralized (I can host my own server and it'll talk to others); it's centralized (one server for many clients); it's modern (HTTP, JSON, REST); it supports push; it synchronises a single history between all clients. It has VoIP, file transfers. There are numerous clients and few are surprisingly mature. Honestly, it's the best protocol out there. I don't know any other protocol with all those features. I really hope, that Matrix will be the IM of our future, it's good enough for that, in contrast to every other popular IM platform. I used vector.im as a web interface, and it just works. I'll try to deploy Matrix as our tiny company internal communication tool. Currently we use a mix of e-mail, skype, whatsapp, telegram, and it just not as good as it could be. I can't force my friends to move to other IM, but I can influence my colleagues, and, hopefully, it'll be the trend. What Matrix really need is some marketing. It's so awesome, I couldn't believe, that I'm so rarely read news about it. Very few people know what it is, and that's a sad situation.

G43nm45ji 10y ago

I Just got weirdly excited by this. I had heard of it before but never really though about what I could do with it. But then I'm never really sure if I understand it completely yet. If i just want to set up a server that me and my friends would use. I can just make a server. they would register on it and we would be good to go? I don't have to join the federation if I don't want to? I understand the advantages of doing so though. Also, how does the vector apps go on battery use and all that. comparable to other messaging apps?

amandine 10y ago
Precisely: just setup the server and off you go, you don't have to federate, although as you say that would be missing part of the fun ;) The Vector app on Android (using GCM) has pretty good perf battery consumption-wise. Unsure how it compares with other apps but we haven't had any particular complaints about it.

Bombthecat 10y ago

Does it have push on iPhone and Android?

aviraldg 10y ago
Yes.