5 ms·

I'm probably really out of the loop, but what is matrix.org? Looks like an open source slack clone? Why do they have >5 million user accounts? Is that everybody

by growt 8y ago

I'm probably really out of the loop, but what is matrix.org? Looks like an open source slack clone? Why do they have >5 million user accounts? Is that everybody who uses that chat tool?

kzcqt 8y ago
Matrix is what happened when somebody looked at XMPP and yelled "NIH".
- yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
  Matrix is what happened when somebody looked at XMPP and yelled "wow, this aged poorly and has some major usability issues".
  - kzcqt 8y ago
    And instead of fixing the issues they just went to do a completely new and incompatible thing. That's the very definition of NIH
    - seba_dos1 8y ago
      Especially that, after some period of stagnation, XMPP is doing pretty fine these days with stepping into the modern world.
      - vertex-four 8y ago
        Ehh... not really. I still can't find a good combination of server, desktop client and iOS client that support things like OMEMO, history sharing between clients, and voice/video chat. And the one iOS client (ChatSecure) looks really dodgy and regularly fails while setting up push notifications.
        kzcqt 8y ago
        And instead of adding those features to existing clients, let's create a brand new protocol, server, desktop client and mobile client. Because why not?
        yannovitch 7y ago
        maybe because, among many other reasons, it takes so much f time for something to change in the XMPP world, because you have to wait for the XSF to validate any change, then all the server devs to implement it, then all the client devs to implement it, then all the sysadmin to update their (very often very old version of) XMPP server, then for the users to update their clients (which, with Android fragmentation for example, is a PITA) ?
        upofadown 8y ago
        I think there are something like 3 iOS clients that support OMEMO now: * https://omemo.top/ https://omemo.top/ * https://monal.im/ https://monal.im/ * https://zom.im/ https://zom.im/
- upofadown 8y ago
  More they looked at IRC/Slack, isn't it? I suppose you could compare it with XMPP group chat which has recently gotten end to end encrypted.
- miloignis 8y ago
  That's not really true, there are significant architectural differences that made sense as a new protocol. (The biggest being that "replicated conversation database for realtime conversations" instead of a point-to-point message sending/routing thing) - Arathorn explained it well in a comment last month https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19419832 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19419832 and the animation at the bottom of the matrix.org homepage was quite helpful for me
KitDuncan 8y ago
Matrix is a federated chat protocol. Matrix.org is just one server instance.
est31 8y ago
I recommend this video for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2eE7rCUKlE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2eE7rCUKlE It describes not just Matrix in the French state (like in the title), it also covers the Matrix 1.0 release and what they want to do with the project (e.g. they eventually want to shut down matrix.org once the ecosystem is mature).
Perceptes 8y ago
This is a good mostly-layman's overview of Matrix: https://www.ruma.io/docs/matrix/ https://www.ruma.io/docs/matrix/

by growt 8y ago

I'm probably really out of the loop, but what is matrix.org? Looks like an open source slack clone? Why do they have >5 million user accounts? Is that everybody who uses that chat tool?

kzcqt 8y ago

Matrix is what happened when somebody looked at XMPP and yelled "NIH".

yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
Matrix is what happened when somebody looked at XMPP and yelled "wow, this aged poorly and has some major usability issues".
- kzcqt 8y ago
  And instead of fixing the issues they just went to do a completely new and incompatible thing. That's the very definition of NIH
  - seba_dos1 8y ago
    Especially that, after some period of stagnation, XMPP is doing pretty fine these days with stepping into the modern world.
    - vertex-four 8y ago
      Ehh... not really. I still can't find a good combination of server, desktop client and iOS client that support things like OMEMO, history sharing between clients, and voice/video chat. And the one iOS client (ChatSecure) looks really dodgy and regularly fails while setting up push notifications.
      - kzcqt 8y ago
        And instead of adding those features to existing clients, let's create a brand new protocol, server, desktop client and mobile client. Because why not?
        yannovitch 7y ago
        maybe because, among many other reasons, it takes so much f time for something to change in the XMPP world, because you have to wait for the XSF to validate any change, then all the server devs to implement it, then all the client devs to implement it, then all the sysadmin to update their (very often very old version of) XMPP server, then for the users to update their clients (which, with Android fragmentation for example, is a PITA) ?
      - upofadown 8y ago
        I think there are something like 3 iOS clients that support OMEMO now: * https://omemo.top/ https://omemo.top/ * https://monal.im/ https://monal.im/ * https://zom.im/ https://zom.im/
upofadown 8y ago
More they looked at IRC/Slack, isn't it? I suppose you could compare it with XMPP group chat which has recently gotten end to end encrypted.
miloignis 8y ago
That's not really true, there are significant architectural differences that made sense as a new protocol. (The biggest being that "replicated conversation database for realtime conversations" instead of a point-to-point message sending/routing thing) - Arathorn explained it well in a comment last month https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19419832 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19419832 and the animation at the bottom of the matrix.org homepage was quite helpful for me

KitDuncan 8y ago

Matrix is a federated chat protocol. Matrix.org is just one server instance.

est31 8y ago

I recommend this video for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2eE7rCUKlE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2eE7rCUKlE It describes not just Matrix in the French state (like in the title), it also covers the Matrix 1.0 release and what they want to do with the project (e.g. they eventually want to shut down matrix.org once the ecosystem is mature).

Perceptes 8y ago

This is a good mostly-layman's overview of Matrix: https://www.ruma.io/docs/matrix/ https://www.ruma.io/docs/matrix/