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This is a software space that could really use more devs. IRC is fine but many people can't use it because it's too technical. We need more user friendly XMPP c

This is a software space that could really use more devs. IRC is fine but many people can't use it because it's too technical. We need more user friendly XMPP clients with features that non-technical people want. I hate Skype but damn if the non-techies I work with don't love it. I tried to download and run Jitsi a couple months ago for a project and it's voice quality was terrible. Skype just works. I sometimes have weird quirky bugs with Adium, and it's getting harder to justify telling my team to use it. Get hacking folks. This space needs better tools.

ChrisClark 8y ago
I've heard Matrix might be a good IRC replacement. But it also still looks rough to me. I only tried it once, but didn't continue as I didn't need it for anything.
- SamWhited 8y ago
  Matrix the protocol is pretty awful, and I'm not a huge fan of the "official" clients, but YMMV. The real problem with it though is that unlike IRC and XMPP the protocol itself isn't developed in a sustainable way by a standards foundation with a reasonable funding model. The protocol itself doesn't really matter that much though as long as we pick one that will be maintained and won't just go bankrupt (so IRC or XMPP depending on what you want to build) and then build nice services that support it. Remember, Slack is a service and a protocol, XMPP/IRC are just protocols. You still need good services like conversations.im or Freenode built on top of them for it to be usable. Unfortunately, we don't have many good services like Slack that have commercial backing but use an open protocol.
- Argorak 8y ago
  Matrix is terrible in as it is purely focused on building a protocol. Everything else is underserved. People are into Chats because of the clients.
  - SamWhited 8y ago
    In all fairness to Matrix, this tends to be XMPP and IRCs biggest fault too. Although I tend to think the protocol needs to be developed by an independent standards body that really only focuses on that (which is the problem with Matrix, it can't go anywhere because it's fettered by a commercial entity that doesn't actually know much about protocol development). IRC and XMPP on the other hand have a standards body, but need to stop advertising them as if only the public network is usable: they need companies on board building their own services that use them (and possibly federate, or possibly allow third party clients).
SamWhited 8y ago
WRT XMPP clients: Dino.im is getting there (although it's still too early and buggy to say it's there yet, I think). I'm still not aware of any decent web clients though, unfortunately. The ones that do exist tend to be developed by individuals and full of security issues, even if they are nice looking and easy to use. I tend to think that we don't need more small community projects, we need one or two entire services like Slack to build themselves on the base protocols and federate. Even if they only allowed their own clients so that they controlled the entire experience, if they just federated with other servers it would give users a choice and largely solve the Slack problem.

ChrisClark 8y ago

I've heard Matrix might be a good IRC replacement. But it also still looks rough to me. I only tried it once, but didn't continue as I didn't need it for anything.

SamWhited 8y ago
Matrix the protocol is pretty awful, and I'm not a huge fan of the "official" clients, but YMMV. The real problem with it though is that unlike IRC and XMPP the protocol itself isn't developed in a sustainable way by a standards foundation with a reasonable funding model. The protocol itself doesn't really matter that much though as long as we pick one that will be maintained and won't just go bankrupt (so IRC or XMPP depending on what you want to build) and then build nice services that support it. Remember, Slack is a service and a protocol, XMPP/IRC are just protocols. You still need good services like conversations.im or Freenode built on top of them for it to be usable. Unfortunately, we don't have many good services like Slack that have commercial backing but use an open protocol.
Argorak 8y ago
Matrix is terrible in as it is purely focused on building a protocol. Everything else is underserved. People are into Chats because of the clients.
- SamWhited 8y ago
  In all fairness to Matrix, this tends to be XMPP and IRCs biggest fault too. Although I tend to think the protocol needs to be developed by an independent standards body that really only focuses on that (which is the problem with Matrix, it can't go anywhere because it's fettered by a commercial entity that doesn't actually know much about protocol development). IRC and XMPP on the other hand have a standards body, but need to stop advertising them as if only the public network is usable: they need companies on board building their own services that use them (and possibly federate, or possibly allow third party clients).

SamWhited 8y ago

WRT XMPP clients: Dino.im is getting there (although it's still too early and buggy to say it's there yet, I think). I'm still not aware of any decent web clients though, unfortunately. The ones that do exist tend to be developed by individuals and full of security issues, even if they are nice looking and easy to use. I tend to think that we don't need more small community projects, we need one or two entire services like Slack to build themselves on the base protocols and federate. Even if they only allowed their own clients so that they controlled the entire experience, if they just federated with other servers it would give users a choice and largely solve the Slack problem.