5 ms·

Folks, use IRC, XMPP, Matrix, etc. Using proprietary protocols is dumb.

g3rv4 8y ago
I wish it was so easy... I don't get to decide what tools my company uses unfortunately
canadaduane 8y ago
I worked at a medium-sized company during the transition from IRC to Slack. The problem the company had was a split in comms networks. There was a lack of will on the part of engineers to move to GChat, and non-engineers were unwilling to respond/engage on IRC. Marketing, Sales, and Admin were using GChat, while engineering used IRC. Getting everyone on the same comms platform was a major improvement. I'm not saying it's ideal, but it wasn't dumb.
- u801e 8y ago
  This is largely the same rational that was used at the company I work at to transition to Slack. From an engineer and developer point of view, I rarely, if ever, directly communicate with non-engineers over instant messaging. For people who deal with different groups of people in the company, shouldn't it be up to them to handle communicating with different groups using different methods rather than compelling everyone to use the same communication platform for instant messaging?
- g3rv4 8y ago
  lol... it rings a bell
- sofaofthedamned 8y ago
  I worked at Cisco, who had their own awful IM client. Our team used Hangouts instead with great success. Company-wide conferences were a ball-ache. The corporate solution didn't mute by default, so with 40000 people in a conf it devolved into a "TURN YOUR MIC OFF" shouting match for the first 10 minutes.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    The more frightening thing is that Cisco (presumably as developer of the client?) couldn't change the defaults to solve one of their own problems.
    - sofaofthedamned 8y ago
      Can't remember, it was a while ago. I will say that anybody who knows what Blizzard is will know how bad their IM was.
  - mschuster91 8y ago
    > I worked at Cisco, who had their own awful IM client. Which one? Webex, Jabber or whatever they use for their 50k€+ videoconferencing systems? I have only had the honor with the first two and, jeez, it's a nightmare...
- Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
  No, it was dumb, and I didn't stutter. It's an extraordinarily short-sighted move to switch to Slack. IRC may not be for everyone, but clients like The Lounge and alternatives like Matrix are quite friendly to non-engineers.
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    I've been contemplating putting The Lounge in front of my IRC servers. How well does it scale? i.e. how many web users can you support with {n} amount of memory/cpu? I've used cgiirc, but it isn't pretty and some people want pretty and client-less.
    - Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
      I'm not sure, to be honest. I would be interested in hearing what you discover if you investigate this yourself.
      - LinuxBender 8y ago
        Certainly! I will keep notes on my setup and performance.
- dvtrn 8y ago
  >The problem the company had was a split in comms networks. My new team is going through this. For comms, my machine came equipped with Skype for Business, Slack, Stride and Bria. It's a fun game rolling the dice when you need to ask someone a question figuring out which comms tool that person uses. A game I've avoided playing altogether by just sending an email.
  - philipodonnell 8y ago
    I thought chat was going to eliminate the need for email. ;-)
    - dvtrn 8y ago
      So say we all, so say we all.
- mst 8y ago
  I confess that, overall, that's been my experience with a few customers and that getting everyone on the same platform was ace. But as somebody who's got gchat gatewayed to IRC, replacing two things I can use from irssi with one thing I can't has always annoyed me.
  - canadaduane 8y ago
    Agreed
rooam-dev 8y ago
I would like to. What is a good video conference solution? To replace zoom (which works great for us so far) for example. Thanks.
- Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
  I like Jitsi. Zero setup, just push go and share the link: https://meet.jit.si/ https://meet.jit.si/ Open source software based on standardized browser technologies.
  - rooam-dev 8y ago
    Thank you. I believe stride's video conference was based on it too, we tried it and wasn't that good. But I will try it separately too.
outworlder 8y ago
I was responsible for getting several development teams on Slack. You see, nowadays few people outside of us hardcore geeks will want to use IRC (my first option). And there are things that "modern" chat clients do better. For instance, our monitoring system can post messages to slack with links to images to allow us to display graphs inline, links to runbooks, and even buttons to take actions. IRC won't do that. Second option was Matrix with its (rather cool) open protocol, but the immaturity of clients and lack of integrations was a problem. Almost everything supports Slack, but good luck finding Matrix support. For our own systems this is manageable, but not all are under our control. Also, we would have to host and manage the infrastructure ourselves. XMPP would be great on the integration front (surprisingly, Slack still wins), but once again it's something we would have to manage. There were other options. Rocket.Chat, Hipchat, Mattermost, you name it. Each one with their own drawbacks. So when asked by my manager what should we use, I could just answer "use slack" immediately, no ifs or buts, and most people would be happy with it.Assuming you have nothing against the company, the biggest technical con is the memory hungry client. The other issues are way harder to justify – big companies rarely care about proprietary protocols as long as they have a vendor to yell at.
- Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
  >links to images to allow us to display graphs inline, links to runbooks, and even buttons to take actions. IRC won't do that. Depends on the client. The Lounge does this.

I wish it was so easy... I don't get to decide what tools my company uses unfortunately

I worked at a medium-sized company during the transition from IRC to Slack. The problem the company had was a split in comms networks. There was a lack of will on the part of engineers to move to GChat, and non-engineers were unwilling to respond/engage on IRC. Marketing, Sales, and Admin were using GChat, while engineering used IRC. Getting everyone on the same comms platform was a major improvement. I'm not saying it's ideal, but it wasn't dumb.

u801e 8y ago
This is largely the same rational that was used at the company I work at to transition to Slack. From an engineer and developer point of view, I rarely, if ever, directly communicate with non-engineers over instant messaging. For people who deal with different groups of people in the company, shouldn't it be up to them to handle communicating with different groups using different methods rather than compelling everyone to use the same communication platform for instant messaging?
g3rv4 8y ago
lol... it rings a bell
sofaofthedamned 8y ago
I worked at Cisco, who had their own awful IM client. Our team used Hangouts instead with great success. Company-wide conferences were a ball-ache. The corporate solution didn't mute by default, so with 40000 people in a conf it devolved into a "TURN YOUR MIC OFF" shouting match for the first 10 minutes.
- ethbro 8y ago
  The more frightening thing is that Cisco (presumably as developer of the client?) couldn't change the defaults to solve one of their own problems.
  - sofaofthedamned 8y ago
    Can't remember, it was a while ago. I will say that anybody who knows what Blizzard is will know how bad their IM was.
- mschuster91 8y ago
  > I worked at Cisco, who had their own awful IM client. Which one? Webex, Jabber or whatever they use for their 50k€+ videoconferencing systems? I have only had the honor with the first two and, jeez, it's a nightmare...
Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
No, it was dumb, and I didn't stutter. It's an extraordinarily short-sighted move to switch to Slack. IRC may not be for everyone, but clients like The Lounge and alternatives like Matrix are quite friendly to non-engineers.
- LinuxBender 8y ago
  I've been contemplating putting The Lounge in front of my IRC servers. How well does it scale? i.e. how many web users can you support with {n} amount of memory/cpu? I've used cgiirc, but it isn't pretty and some people want pretty and client-less.
  - Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
    I'm not sure, to be honest. I would be interested in hearing what you discover if you investigate this yourself.
    - LinuxBender 8y ago
      Certainly! I will keep notes on my setup and performance.
dvtrn 8y ago
>The problem the company had was a split in comms networks. My new team is going through this. For comms, my machine came equipped with Skype for Business, Slack, Stride and Bria. It's a fun game rolling the dice when you need to ask someone a question figuring out which comms tool that person uses. A game I've avoided playing altogether by just sending an email.
- philipodonnell 8y ago
  I thought chat was going to eliminate the need for email. ;-)
  - dvtrn 8y ago
    So say we all, so say we all.
mst 8y ago
I confess that, overall, that's been my experience with a few customers and that getting everyone on the same platform was ace. But as somebody who's got gchat gatewayed to IRC, replacing two things I can use from irssi with one thing I can't has always annoyed me.
- canadaduane 8y ago
  Agreed

rooam-dev 8y ago

I would like to. What is a good video conference solution? To replace zoom (which works great for us so far) for example. Thanks.

Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
I like Jitsi. Zero setup, just push go and share the link: https://meet.jit.si/ https://meet.jit.si/ Open source software based on standardized browser technologies.
- rooam-dev 8y ago
  Thank you. I believe stride's video conference was based on it too, we tried it and wasn't that good. But I will try it separately too.

outworlder 8y ago

I was responsible for getting several development teams on Slack. You see, nowadays few people outside of us hardcore geeks will want to use IRC (my first option). And there are things that "modern" chat clients do better. For instance, our monitoring system can post messages to slack with links to images to allow us to display graphs inline, links to runbooks, and even buttons to take actions. IRC won't do that. Second option was Matrix with its (rather cool) open protocol, but the immaturity of clients and lack of integrations was a problem. Almost everything supports Slack, but good luck finding Matrix support. For our own systems this is manageable, but not all are under our control. Also, we would have to host and manage the infrastructure ourselves. XMPP would be great on the integration front (surprisingly, Slack still wins), but once again it's something we would have to manage. There were other options. Rocket.Chat, Hipchat, Mattermost, you name it. Each one with their own drawbacks. So when asked by my manager what should we use, I could just answer "use slack" immediately, no ifs or buts, and most people would be happy with it.Assuming you have nothing against the company, the biggest technical con is the memory hungry client. The other issues are way harder to justify – big companies rarely care about proprietary protocols as long as they have a vendor to yell at.

Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
>links to images to allow us to display graphs inline, links to runbooks, and even buttons to take actions. IRC won't do that. Depends on the client. The Lounge does this.