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Open-Source Slack Alternative Mattermost Gets $50M Funding

327 points by wheresvic1 7y ago

softwaredoug 7y ago
You mean a company monetizing an open source project gets funding. Why do we persist in the 1-1 OSS project-company mapping fallacy
- frenchman99 7y ago
  In this specific case, isn't it the Mattermost company that funds most of the development of the OSS project ?
  - softwaredoug 7y ago
    Yeah, this is true in a lot of cases. But it seems to go against the spirit of open source and turn it into a shared source model... maybe that's fine, but it ends up with people using open source as a marketing vehicle to attract developers rather than being truly "free and open source" where governance and viability isn’t tied to a single company’s fate.
    - iteriteratedone 7y ago
      Yea , the free software debate is as old as os. Hasnt stopped a thing.
    - yoz-y 7y ago
      If the governance is well set up from the get go I think this model is fine. At some point you need money to make quality software.
    - mwfunk 7y ago
      If it has an open source license, it is 100% truly "free and open source". That's a good thing, not a bad thing! There's nothing magic about foundations or volunteer organizations that make some things more open sourcey than others. That's the beauty of it, the lifetime of the code isn't bound to the lifetime of whoever made it, for whatever reason they chose to make it or stop making it. It's just the license, not who wrote the software, and not why they wrote it. Everyone gets the benefit of their labors regardless. Volunteer communities and nonprofits are no silver bullet either- they're great when they exist and function well, but they don't always, and are highly dependent on who's involved, how much, and why. If there's a big, strong, vibrant community behind something, that's a good sign for whatever that thing is, but very few projects rise to that level of centrality in people's lives. There's also no shortage of projects without funding which have terrible or nonexistent communities surrounding them. Usually good communities arise during the long tail of maturity, like years or decades after whatever it is has reached a plateau of collective usefulness. Good software leads to good communities, sometimes, eventually, but it generally doesn't go the other direction. Something has to be great for years before it becomes that critical and that supported of a piece of infrastructure. That's why it's good that open source is only a factor of the license, not who made it, not who maintains it, not why they maintain it, and not how it's funded. That's literally what is special about it and makes open source a useful and good thing.
tlackemann 7y ago
We recently switched from Slack to Mattermost and love it. My only gripe is that replies show up in the main room thread which makes catching up on posts almost impossible. There is a request to implement collapsible threads[0] but I haven't seen any new updates address this. I'm hoping this new funding round amps up a few developers to take on this much-needed feature. [0] https://mattermost.uservoice.com/forums/306457-general/suggestions/19572469-make-threads-collapsible https://mattermost.uservoice.com/forums/306457-general/sugge...
- bluetidepro 7y ago
  > We recently switched from Slack to Mattermost and love it. > ...makes catching up on posts almost impossible. Seems odd those 2 statements are in the same comment. How can you love a product that has such a big flaw in the basic workflow? For the record, I've never even heard of Mattermost until today, but just thought that was strange to read your comment.
  - tobr 7y ago
    I don’t think it’s strange to “love” something just because you can point out its flaws. It’s not like the alternative is perfect, and depending on your point of view, it might have flaws that are more fundamental or hard to fix.
    - bluetidepro 7y ago
      That's fair. I don't know, I guess it just read funny to me at first, but you're right.
    - zaphirplane 7y ago
      I was going to post the same message as the parent poster Let try it with an couple of other examples I love the ford abc but the steering feedback makes it impossible to steer I love the new Panasonic tv, but the way it shows black makes it impossible to watch movies
- p2detar 7y ago
skrowl 7y ago
We've been using a combination of Discord / Telegram / Google Meet instead of Slack and haven't had any problems. There are lots of great alternatives out there.
- intea 7y ago
  I wish there was something as simple to use as Discord but selfhosted. The closest thing I've found so far was rocket.chat which is only halfway done or Matrix which has close to no admin tools available.
  - dd36 7y ago
    Mattermost.
- mises 7y ago
  I'm no slack advocate, but you just described using three services to replace one. There will be some extra mental overhead to such a setup, even if it is not huge. I think something like mattermost carries the advantage of one service, one interface, one place for things; it's a little easier than "oh, in which did I put that?".
  - nwalker85 7y ago
    They also just described 3 services where you don't own the data.
    - NikolaeVarius 7y ago
      Also none of them are open source
    - skrowl 7y ago
      You DEFINITELY don't own your Slack data
      - nwalker85 7y ago
pksadiq 7y ago
The mattermost-server licensing[0] is somewhat skeptic: Mattermost Licensing SOFTWARE LICENSING You are licensed to use compiled versions of the Mattermost platform produced by Mattermost, Inc. under an MIT LICENSE - See MIT-COMPILED-LICENSE.md included in compiled versions for details You may be licensed to use source code to create compiled versions not produced by Mattermost, Inc. in one of two ways: 1. Under the Free Software Foundation’s GNU AGPL v.3.0, subject to the exceptions outlined in this policy; or 2. Under a commercial license available from Mattermost, Inc. by contacting commercial@mattermost.com You are licensed to use the source code in Admin Tools and Configuration Files (templates/, config/default.json, model/, plugin/ and all subdirectories thereof) under the Apache License v2.0. So that means, only the binary provided by Mattermost is MIT, not its source code, the usage of 'MIT' in their website sounds deceiving. [0] https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-server/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-server/blob/master/...
- swiley 7y ago
  So if they accept contributions from the community does the copyright on those get reassigned to mattermost?
  - driverdan 7y ago
    No, that's not how copyright works.
    - johncolanduoni 7y ago
      There are software projects that use/require copyright assignment (notably many GNU projects require assignment to the FSF).
      - bildung 7y ago
        Yes but in these situation the copyright assignment is a separate contract underwritten by the person committing. What (I think) driverdan means is that an OSS licence legally cannot substitute this separate contract - one cannot automatically assign one's own copyright to another entity by following an OSS licence.
entropea 7y ago
I feel like someone could corner the market just by making tab complete that works as well as IRC did and adding a full dark theme to the desktop client.
grizzles 7y ago
Is there an open source slack alternative that's simple to setup? I'd settle for just a react gui with the nice screens. The trend of commercial open source apps to be a major PITA to deploy & hack on is kind of tiresome imo.
- borski 7y ago
  https://github.com/mozilla/mattermost-heroku/ https://github.com/mozilla/mattermost-heroku/ Go hit this “Deploy to Heroku” button. Alternatively, Mattermost also has a Docker container: https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-docker https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-docker
- vetinari 7y ago
  Zulip (https://zulipchat.com/ https://zulipchat.com/) is pretty easy to setup - if you deploy to Ubuntu or Debian.
- MayeulC 7y ago
  To be honest (and partial, since I haven't self-hosted many contenders), I didn't find Matrix that complicated to setup. The most complex and resource-hungry part is federation, but you can likely do without if you don't need it (since it is one of the biggest selling points of the tech, I am afraid there shouldn't be many guides omitting that part). I did it trough Yunohost on my server, but I hear there is a handy Docker-ansible playbook, and that the Archlinux package works pretty well (synapse is also available trough pip). I guess someone could cook up a non-federating server implementation some day…
- niutech 7y ago
  Have a look at https://rocket.chat/install https://rocket.chat/install or https://sdelements.github.io/lets-chat/ https://sdelements.github.io/lets-chat/
sschueller 7y ago
I find rocketchat a much better match and the mobile version also work very well.
- miguelmota 7y ago
  Some things I have issues with rocketchat is the insane amount of node_modules, random crashes, uses mongodb, and it's a pain to customize
- buboard 7y ago
  I wish they made rocketchat simpler to integrate with an existing website.
mentos 7y ago
What about a Open Source Slack competitor that is funded by shorting Slack stock?
- andruby 7y ago
  It’s not a zero-sum game. Both can keep growing.
- VRay 7y ago
  Go for it, dude, I'll pitch in on the mobile app once you get the funding
lcfcjs2 7y ago
I'm still confused by how a chat app like Slack got so popular.
wiradikusuma 7y ago
If you need on-prem and LDAP but don't want to pay, check Zulip. We evaluated Mattermost, but its LDAP is not free.
- hackersword 7y ago
  Slightly bothersome, but you can use gitlab as a SSO provider for mattermost, and gitlab can be easily (free) integrated with LDAP.
  - vetinari 7y ago
    From https://docs.mattermost.com/deployment/sso-gitlab.html https://docs.mattermost.com/deployment/sso-gitlab.html > Only the default GitLab SSO is officially supported. “Double SSO”, where GitLab SSO is chained to other SSO solutions, is not supported. It may be possible to connect GitLab SSO with AD, LDAP, SAML, or MFA add-ons in some cases, but because of the special logic required they’re not officially supported and are known not to work on some experiences. If having official AD, LDAP, SAML or MFA support is critical to your enterprise, please consider Mattermost Enterprise Edition as an option.
    - tyldum 7y ago
      Odd statement. Works like a charm for us with AD backed SSO on GitLab.
    - ephimetheus 7y ago
      I believe this is what we use at CERN, and as far as I can tell it works good enough.
    - hackersword 7y ago
      I believe mattermost actually ships w/ gitlab included , or you can host your own seperate/existing gitlab installation. I am using it currently with freeipa with zero issues.
- lkurusa 7y ago
  My experience with Zulip has also been pretty great. We (a startup) found that it keeps the conversation more focused.
staunch 7y ago
Sincere question: what's the point of GitLab or Mattermost being open source when they clearly want to control/restrict/monopolize use of their applications? IIRC GitLab is "open core" which just means it's not fully open source and Mattermost is not really fully open source either, it its own confusing way. The purpose of open source was to give users full and unrestricted power. To free them from lock in and allow them to be the masters of the software they use. It seems that these companies view open source as a marketing trick and perhaps a way to save on development costs. They're making a mockery of open source and should probably be shunned for it.
- hannob 7y ago
  > Mattermost is not really fully open source either, it its own confusing way. Honestly curious: In which way is Mattermost not Open Source? As far as I can tell the code is under AGPL, which may not be the most popular FOSS license, but is generally accepted as being one.
- augustohp 7y ago
  I think it is a pretty fair as they have people working full time in their products since their conception. I'd rather companies providing their source and strugling to monetize their product than companies selling just closed source alternatives. Restrictions could be provided by people through OSS, these companies don't prevent these alternatives from existing. The lack of interest does. The same could be said about many OSS that strugle to receive donations. I could agree that a world where only OSS without monetization exists, where people donate and keep people investing their time on improving OSS without needing restrictions. The reality is that without these restrictions, people are not willing to pay.
- icebraining 7y ago
  > IIRC GitLab is "open core" which just means it's not fully open source Gitlab CE is fully open source. Gitlab EE is proprietary. The same company produces both, but you can decide to use only the former, and remain fully in control. This is certainly not the vision of the future that supporters of a fully-FOSS world like me wish to see, but seems strictly better than most proprietary companies, which still use FOSS code/libraries while contributing little or nothing.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
When open source projects get VC funding, it makes me trust them less. Eventually, the investors are going to want their money back with a profit. When that happens, the companies are going to try to monetize their offering often in ways that are detrimental to the open source project.
- makapuf 7y ago
  I'd say I trust more companies that already are earning money and open source something, it's less likely that they will bait and switch to a proprietary. Or some like mattermost or mariadb are clean about a possible business plan. Way better than a non standard open source license and vague prospects of VC money.
- xgulfie 7y ago
  Any VC funded company gives me this feeling. Twitter scaled up ads a whole lot to become solvent. Moviepass went from an amazing deal to an okay one. Netflix's content catalog and price went from great to okay. Facebook went from "Myspace but with photos" to the massive advertising machine it is today. The great-for-users but usually lossy beginnings of these companies are a play to acquire users, so they can pull the profit switch later on.
  - farisjarrah 7y ago
    Just wait till Uber and Lyft investors start demanding profits...
  - dmlittle 7y ago
    FWIW Moviepass never had a sustainable business model. They were loosing a lot of money from the get-go.
    - duxup 7y ago
      Arguably many VC funded companies don't have a sustainable model...
  - 7y ago
exabrial 7y ago
What blows my mind about Mattermost is the server requirements... for what essentially is a message broker, you have need a multi-gig box for a deployment that can support 8 people. Part of the problem is their tech stack.
- qeternity 7y ago
  For someone who has no experience with Mattermost, can you explain? This seems crazy.
- jasonblais 7y ago
  Generally the requirements depend on factors like network speeds and estimated storage usage per user. Here's more information on Mattermost hardware requirements: https://docs.mattermost.com/install/requirements.html#hardware-requirements https://docs.mattermost.com/install/requirements.html#hardwa... Would love to learn more if you have concerns about server hardware requirements.
- matoro 7y ago
  That sounds like overestimating just to be safe. I run an MM instance for triple that number of people on an ARM SOC with 2GB RAM and it works beautifully. Not only that but I compile it from source on the same box with no problems.
xtracto 7y ago
Does Mattermost support drawing on screen share? It is one of the killer features for me in Slack, and at some point Google Hangouts had it but removed it, and Meet does not have it.
buboard 7y ago
I wonder if anyone is working on a discord/slack-like app based on janus (the rtc server that powers slack, i think).
LeicaLatte 7y ago
As someone who uses their self hosted version day in and out, best wishes to them!
jpeeler 7y ago
I'm pretty amazed at the number of chat offerings that don't offer encryption. (From a quick Google search it seems Mattermost doesn't either.) I'm still holding out for Matrix to deliver (I know it's currently working for some people), but my understanding is that it's not enabled by default yet: https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/6779 https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/6779
- walterbell 7y ago
  Work is underway at IETF on MLS for E2E encrypted group messaging, https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/ https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/
  - Arathorn 7y ago
    We're looking at MLS for Matrix too. The only reason E2E isn't enabled by default on Matrix today is E2E-enabled search isn't finished yet
    - MayeulC 7y ago
      I thought you were also waiting for cross-signing (which seems to have progressed quite well) to land? Isn't E2E search mostly a client-side matter? Unless using homomorphic encryption, of course, which I don't think OLM is capable of? Or are you planning on using another trick, similar to hashing the strings client-side when a new message is received, then sending the hashs and later searching those server-side? I'm curious since I haven't seen that mentioned other than using pantalaimon as some kind of server-side search engine. I can ask or discuss this further in matrix(-spec):matrix.org as needed/preferred.
      - Arathorn 7y ago
        Cross-signing is basically there at the SDK & server level; just needs the UX to be added into Riot, but we prioritised https://matrix.org/blog/2019/06/30/tightening-up-privacy-in-matrix/ https://matrix.org/blog/2019/06/30/tightening-up-privacy-in-... so running a few weeks behind. E2E search is entire client-side, and works thanks to https://github.com/matrix-org/pantalaimon/tree/search https://github.com/matrix-org/pantalaimon/tree/search. We're not doing homomorphic stuff; instead we're thinking about encrypting the tantivy indexes and storing them serverside.
EGreg 7y ago
I see a lot of cool Slack competitors. Including Keybase Teams. But raising $50M seems like a lot for an open source one! It makes me hopeful that we will be able to raise that kind of money soon for our platform. We also have AGPL dual license. However, our goal is more ambitious: we built a platform (https://qbix.com/platform https://qbix.com/platform) to let ANYONE build their OWN social apps and plugins, and then let communities host them. Like Wordpress + Plugins but for Web 2.0 (think Facebook rather than blogs). I imagine building a Slack competitor would take about a month of focused work. And then anyone would be able to install it, on one machine. But, we spent all these years building the tech and doing security audits. What are your recommendations business-wise, to take it from here to getting funding like this? (Without compromising the vision.)
xfalcox 7y ago
We are using Mattermost for over a year at work, and I would love to get a native client for their app, even a bare bones one. Currently running it with https://github.com/EionRobb/purple-mattermost https://github.com/EionRobb/purple-mattermost but something more supported would be great
- abraka 7y ago
  you mean like... the official dekstop client @ https://github.com/mattermost/desktop https://github.com/mattermost/desktop ?
  - yitosda 7y ago
    It's odd that that page refers to the desktop client as "native". The parts of an electron app that are native to the OS (as opposed to the OS-independent HTML/JS) are irrelevant to most people's desire for "native" apps. Electron is not native.
  - unsigner 7y ago
    Electron is not native.
  - hackersword 7y ago
    The client is just an electron app (ie a very thin wrapper around a webpage). One of the more glaring examples is unable to monitor inactivity and set away status correctly.
AaronFriel 7y ago
If anyone from Mattermost is listening, it would be wonderful if they offered the whitelabel deployment (for SSO) of apps as a service. For a startup without any presence on the Apple or Google app stores or specific mobile needs, it would be amazing to have someone package that up for enterprise customers and take care of keeping the app up to date.
- crispyporkbites 7y ago
  Why would Mattermost do this and not a specific provider?
  - AaronFriel 7y ago
    That depends on what you mean by "provider", I suppose. Google is not going to be interested in doing this, I suppose a consultancy or MSP could offer this as a service if they resell Mattermost, but I don't know if Mattermost has that sort of sales network or system. On the other hand, for enterprise plan users it would make sense to rely on Mattermost for app distribution, and they have the expertise to publish the apps and ensure they're approved in the respective stores. Would a reseller or MSP necessarily have that competency? I come from the IT world where the answer would definitely be "no", but I could see it being part of contracted out work. Who owns the app then after that contract is up?
hartator 7y ago
I am very disappointed by Slack decision to remove screen sharing. We won't be paying customers from now on. Screenhero was an awesome product. I don't get why they are killing it.
- duxup 7y ago
  Screen sharing products seem to be finicky or massive out of control and hard to use apps. Maybe there is a technical reason screen sharing is so wonky.
Improvotter 7y ago
I'm using Mattermost for communicating with one team and I absolutely hate it. It feels so completely unfinished, like it's some kind of proof-of-concept? I don't mean to diss on Mattermost, I'm actually very excited to see them getting funding as Slack has like their name implies: slacking. What has Slack done over these past few years? Exactly, nothing! I don't mean that good software needs to keep updating, no not at all. It's just Slack can improve so much and it's just sitting there. I am really looking forward to replacing Slack with something else. For all of the people going to suggest Matrix or something else to me, hold your breath. The reason I haven't switched is because communities haven't switched and neither have companies.
alphagrep12345 7y ago
I don't get it. What's the need for an open source slack alternative?
- pas 7y ago
  Unlimited message retention. Different bells and whistles.
- thiht 7y ago
  Self hosting
- parent5446 7y ago
  It's because Slack is closed source.

327 points by wheresvic1 7y ago

You mean a company monetizing an open source project gets funding. Why do we persist in the 1-1 OSS project-company mapping fallacy

frenchman99 7y ago
In this specific case, isn't it the Mattermost company that funds most of the development of the OSS project ?
- softwaredoug 7y ago
  Yeah, this is true in a lot of cases. But it seems to go against the spirit of open source and turn it into a shared source model... maybe that's fine, but it ends up with people using open source as a marketing vehicle to attract developers rather than being truly "free and open source" where governance and viability isn’t tied to a single company’s fate.
  - iteriteratedone 7y ago
    Yea , the free software debate is as old as os. Hasnt stopped a thing.
  - yoz-y 7y ago
    If the governance is well set up from the get go I think this model is fine. At some point you need money to make quality software.
  - mwfunk 7y ago
    If it has an open source license, it is 100% truly "free and open source". That's a good thing, not a bad thing! There's nothing magic about foundations or volunteer organizations that make some things more open sourcey than others. That's the beauty of it, the lifetime of the code isn't bound to the lifetime of whoever made it, for whatever reason they chose to make it or stop making it. It's just the license, not who wrote the software, and not why they wrote it. Everyone gets the benefit of their labors regardless. Volunteer communities and nonprofits are no silver bullet either- they're great when they exist and function well, but they don't always, and are highly dependent on who's involved, how much, and why. If there's a big, strong, vibrant community behind something, that's a good sign for whatever that thing is, but very few projects rise to that level of centrality in people's lives. There's also no shortage of projects without funding which have terrible or nonexistent communities surrounding them. Usually good communities arise during the long tail of maturity, like years or decades after whatever it is has reached a plateau of collective usefulness. Good software leads to good communities, sometimes, eventually, but it generally doesn't go the other direction. Something has to be great for years before it becomes that critical and that supported of a piece of infrastructure. That's why it's good that open source is only a factor of the license, not who made it, not who maintains it, not why they maintain it, and not how it's funded. That's literally what is special about it and makes open source a useful and good thing.

tlackemann 7y ago

We recently switched from Slack to Mattermost and love it. My only gripe is that replies show up in the main room thread which makes catching up on posts almost impossible. There is a request to implement collapsible threads[0] but I haven't seen any new updates address this. I'm hoping this new funding round amps up a few developers to take on this much-needed feature. [0] https://mattermost.uservoice.com/forums/306457-general/suggestions/19572469-make-threads-collapsible https://mattermost.uservoice.com/forums/306457-general/sugge...

bluetidepro 7y ago
> We recently switched from Slack to Mattermost and love it. > ...makes catching up on posts almost impossible. Seems odd those 2 statements are in the same comment. How can you love a product that has such a big flaw in the basic workflow? For the record, I've never even heard of Mattermost until today, but just thought that was strange to read your comment.
- tobr 7y ago
  I don’t think it’s strange to “love” something just because you can point out its flaws. It’s not like the alternative is perfect, and depending on your point of view, it might have flaws that are more fundamental or hard to fix.
  - bluetidepro 7y ago
    That's fair. I don't know, I guess it just read funny to me at first, but you're right.
  - zaphirplane 7y ago
    I was going to post the same message as the parent poster Let try it with an couple of other examples I love the ford abc but the steering feedback makes it impossible to steer I love the new Panasonic tv, but the way it shows black makes it impossible to watch movies
p2detar 7y ago

skrowl 7y ago

We've been using a combination of Discord / Telegram / Google Meet instead of Slack and haven't had any problems. There are lots of great alternatives out there.

intea 7y ago
I wish there was something as simple to use as Discord but selfhosted. The closest thing I've found so far was rocket.chat which is only halfway done or Matrix which has close to no admin tools available.
- dd36 7y ago
  Mattermost.
mises 7y ago
I'm no slack advocate, but you just described using three services to replace one. There will be some extra mental overhead to such a setup, even if it is not huge. I think something like mattermost carries the advantage of one service, one interface, one place for things; it's a little easier than "oh, in which did I put that?".
- nwalker85 7y ago
  They also just described 3 services where you don't own the data.
  - NikolaeVarius 7y ago
    Also none of them are open source
  - skrowl 7y ago
    You DEFINITELY don't own your Slack data
    - nwalker85 7y ago

pksadiq 7y ago

The mattermost-server licensing[0] is somewhat skeptic: Mattermost Licensing SOFTWARE LICENSING You are licensed to use compiled versions of the Mattermost platform produced by Mattermost, Inc. under an MIT LICENSE - See MIT-COMPILED-LICENSE.md included in compiled versions for details You may be licensed to use source code to create compiled versions not produced by Mattermost, Inc. in one of two ways: 1. Under the Free Software Foundation’s GNU AGPL v.3.0, subject to the exceptions outlined in this policy; or 2. Under a commercial license available from Mattermost, Inc. by contacting commercial@mattermost.com You are licensed to use the source code in Admin Tools and Configuration Files (templates/, config/default.json, model/, plugin/ and all subdirectories thereof) under the Apache License v2.0. So that means, only the binary provided by Mattermost is MIT, not its source code, the usage of 'MIT' in their website sounds deceiving. [0] https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-server/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-server/blob/master/...

swiley 7y ago
So if they accept contributions from the community does the copyright on those get reassigned to mattermost?
- driverdan 7y ago
  No, that's not how copyright works.
  - johncolanduoni 7y ago
    There are software projects that use/require copyright assignment (notably many GNU projects require assignment to the FSF).
    - bildung 7y ago
      Yes but in these situation the copyright assignment is a separate contract underwritten by the person committing. What (I think) driverdan means is that an OSS licence legally cannot substitute this separate contract - one cannot automatically assign one's own copyright to another entity by following an OSS licence.

entropea 7y ago

I feel like someone could corner the market just by making tab complete that works as well as IRC did and adding a full dark theme to the desktop client.

grizzles 7y ago

Is there an open source slack alternative that's simple to setup? I'd settle for just a react gui with the nice screens. The trend of commercial open source apps to be a major PITA to deploy & hack on is kind of tiresome imo.

borski 7y ago
https://github.com/mozilla/mattermost-heroku/ https://github.com/mozilla/mattermost-heroku/ Go hit this “Deploy to Heroku” button. Alternatively, Mattermost also has a Docker container: https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-docker https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-docker
vetinari 7y ago
Zulip (https://zulipchat.com/ https://zulipchat.com/) is pretty easy to setup - if you deploy to Ubuntu or Debian.
MayeulC 7y ago
To be honest (and partial, since I haven't self-hosted many contenders), I didn't find Matrix that complicated to setup. The most complex and resource-hungry part is federation, but you can likely do without if you don't need it (since it is one of the biggest selling points of the tech, I am afraid there shouldn't be many guides omitting that part). I did it trough Yunohost on my server, but I hear there is a handy Docker-ansible playbook, and that the Archlinux package works pretty well (synapse is also available trough pip). I guess someone could cook up a non-federating server implementation some day…
niutech 7y ago
Have a look at https://rocket.chat/install https://rocket.chat/install or https://sdelements.github.io/lets-chat/ https://sdelements.github.io/lets-chat/

sschueller 7y ago

I find rocketchat a much better match and the mobile version also work very well.

miguelmota 7y ago
Some things I have issues with rocketchat is the insane amount of node_modules, random crashes, uses mongodb, and it's a pain to customize
buboard 7y ago
I wish they made rocketchat simpler to integrate with an existing website.

mentos 7y ago

What about a Open Source Slack competitor that is funded by shorting Slack stock?

andruby 7y ago
It’s not a zero-sum game. Both can keep growing.
VRay 7y ago
Go for it, dude, I'll pitch in on the mobile app once you get the funding

lcfcjs2 7y ago

I'm still confused by how a chat app like Slack got so popular.

wiradikusuma 7y ago

If you need on-prem and LDAP but don't want to pay, check Zulip. We evaluated Mattermost, but its LDAP is not free.

hackersword 7y ago
Slightly bothersome, but you can use gitlab as a SSO provider for mattermost, and gitlab can be easily (free) integrated with LDAP.
- vetinari 7y ago
  From https://docs.mattermost.com/deployment/sso-gitlab.html https://docs.mattermost.com/deployment/sso-gitlab.html > Only the default GitLab SSO is officially supported. “Double SSO”, where GitLab SSO is chained to other SSO solutions, is not supported. It may be possible to connect GitLab SSO with AD, LDAP, SAML, or MFA add-ons in some cases, but because of the special logic required they’re not officially supported and are known not to work on some experiences. If having official AD, LDAP, SAML or MFA support is critical to your enterprise, please consider Mattermost Enterprise Edition as an option.
  - tyldum 7y ago
    Odd statement. Works like a charm for us with AD backed SSO on GitLab.
  - ephimetheus 7y ago
    I believe this is what we use at CERN, and as far as I can tell it works good enough.
  - hackersword 7y ago
    I believe mattermost actually ships w/ gitlab included , or you can host your own seperate/existing gitlab installation. I am using it currently with freeipa with zero issues.
lkurusa 7y ago
My experience with Zulip has also been pretty great. We (a startup) found that it keeps the conversation more focused.

staunch 7y ago

Sincere question: what's the point of GitLab or Mattermost being open source when they clearly want to control/restrict/monopolize use of their applications? IIRC GitLab is "open core" which just means it's not fully open source and Mattermost is not really fully open source either, it its own confusing way. The purpose of open source was to give users full and unrestricted power. To free them from lock in and allow them to be the masters of the software they use. It seems that these companies view open source as a marketing trick and perhaps a way to save on development costs. They're making a mockery of open source and should probably be shunned for it.

hannob 7y ago
> Mattermost is not really fully open source either, it its own confusing way. Honestly curious: In which way is Mattermost not Open Source? As far as I can tell the code is under AGPL, which may not be the most popular FOSS license, but is generally accepted as being one.
augustohp 7y ago
I think it is a pretty fair as they have people working full time in their products since their conception. I'd rather companies providing their source and strugling to monetize their product than companies selling just closed source alternatives. Restrictions could be provided by people through OSS, these companies don't prevent these alternatives from existing. The lack of interest does. The same could be said about many OSS that strugle to receive donations. I could agree that a world where only OSS without monetization exists, where people donate and keep people investing their time on improving OSS without needing restrictions. The reality is that without these restrictions, people are not willing to pay.
icebraining 7y ago
> IIRC GitLab is "open core" which just means it's not fully open source Gitlab CE is fully open source. Gitlab EE is proprietary. The same company produces both, but you can decide to use only the former, and remain fully in control. This is certainly not the vision of the future that supporters of a fully-FOSS world like me wish to see, but seems strictly better than most proprietary companies, which still use FOSS code/libraries while contributing little or nothing.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago

When open source projects get VC funding, it makes me trust them less. Eventually, the investors are going to want their money back with a profit. When that happens, the companies are going to try to monetize their offering often in ways that are detrimental to the open source project.

makapuf 7y ago
I'd say I trust more companies that already are earning money and open source something, it's less likely that they will bait and switch to a proprietary. Or some like mattermost or mariadb are clean about a possible business plan. Way better than a non standard open source license and vague prospects of VC money.
xgulfie 7y ago
Any VC funded company gives me this feeling. Twitter scaled up ads a whole lot to become solvent. Moviepass went from an amazing deal to an okay one. Netflix's content catalog and price went from great to okay. Facebook went from "Myspace but with photos" to the massive advertising machine it is today. The great-for-users but usually lossy beginnings of these companies are a play to acquire users, so they can pull the profit switch later on.
- farisjarrah 7y ago
  Just wait till Uber and Lyft investors start demanding profits...
- dmlittle 7y ago
  FWIW Moviepass never had a sustainable business model. They were loosing a lot of money from the get-go.
  - duxup 7y ago
    Arguably many VC funded companies don't have a sustainable model...
- 7y ago

exabrial 7y ago

What blows my mind about Mattermost is the server requirements... for what essentially is a message broker, you have need a multi-gig box for a deployment that can support 8 people. Part of the problem is their tech stack.

qeternity 7y ago
For someone who has no experience with Mattermost, can you explain? This seems crazy.
jasonblais 7y ago
Generally the requirements depend on factors like network speeds and estimated storage usage per user. Here's more information on Mattermost hardware requirements: https://docs.mattermost.com/install/requirements.html#hardware-requirements https://docs.mattermost.com/install/requirements.html#hardwa... Would love to learn more if you have concerns about server hardware requirements.
matoro 7y ago
That sounds like overestimating just to be safe. I run an MM instance for triple that number of people on an ARM SOC with 2GB RAM and it works beautifully. Not only that but I compile it from source on the same box with no problems.

xtracto 7y ago

Does Mattermost support drawing on screen share? It is one of the killer features for me in Slack, and at some point Google Hangouts had it but removed it, and Meet does not have it.

buboard 7y ago

I wonder if anyone is working on a discord/slack-like app based on janus (the rtc server that powers slack, i think).

LeicaLatte 7y ago

As someone who uses their self hosted version day in and out, best wishes to them!

jpeeler 7y ago

I'm pretty amazed at the number of chat offerings that don't offer encryption. (From a quick Google search it seems Mattermost doesn't either.) I'm still holding out for Matrix to deliver (I know it's currently working for some people), but my understanding is that it's not enabled by default yet: https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/6779 https://github.com/vector-im/riot-web/issues/6779

walterbell 7y ago
Work is underway at IETF on MLS for E2E encrypted group messaging, https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/ https://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/mls/about/
- Arathorn 7y ago
  We're looking at MLS for Matrix too. The only reason E2E isn't enabled by default on Matrix today is E2E-enabled search isn't finished yet
  - MayeulC 7y ago
    I thought you were also waiting for cross-signing (which seems to have progressed quite well) to land? Isn't E2E search mostly a client-side matter? Unless using homomorphic encryption, of course, which I don't think OLM is capable of? Or are you planning on using another trick, similar to hashing the strings client-side when a new message is received, then sending the hashs and later searching those server-side? I'm curious since I haven't seen that mentioned other than using pantalaimon as some kind of server-side search engine. I can ask or discuss this further in matrix(-spec):matrix.org as needed/preferred.
    - Arathorn 7y ago
      Cross-signing is basically there at the SDK & server level; just needs the UX to be added into Riot, but we prioritised https://matrix.org/blog/2019/06/30/tightening-up-privacy-in-matrix/ https://matrix.org/blog/2019/06/30/tightening-up-privacy-in-... so running a few weeks behind. E2E search is entire client-side, and works thanks to https://github.com/matrix-org/pantalaimon/tree/search https://github.com/matrix-org/pantalaimon/tree/search. We're not doing homomorphic stuff; instead we're thinking about encrypting the tantivy indexes and storing them serverside.

EGreg 7y ago

I see a lot of cool Slack competitors. Including Keybase Teams. But raising $50M seems like a lot for an open source one! It makes me hopeful that we will be able to raise that kind of money soon for our platform. We also have AGPL dual license. However, our goal is more ambitious: we built a platform (https://qbix.com/platform https://qbix.com/platform) to let ANYONE build their OWN social apps and plugins, and then let communities host them. Like Wordpress + Plugins but for Web 2.0 (think Facebook rather than blogs). I imagine building a Slack competitor would take about a month of focused work. And then anyone would be able to install it, on one machine. But, we spent all these years building the tech and doing security audits. What are your recommendations business-wise, to take it from here to getting funding like this? (Without compromising the vision.)

xfalcox 7y ago

We are using Mattermost for over a year at work, and I would love to get a native client for their app, even a bare bones one. Currently running it with https://github.com/EionRobb/purple-mattermost https://github.com/EionRobb/purple-mattermost but something more supported would be great

abraka 7y ago
you mean like... the official dekstop client @ https://github.com/mattermost/desktop https://github.com/mattermost/desktop ?
- yitosda 7y ago
  It's odd that that page refers to the desktop client as "native". The parts of an electron app that are native to the OS (as opposed to the OS-independent HTML/JS) are irrelevant to most people's desire for "native" apps. Electron is not native.
- unsigner 7y ago
  Electron is not native.
- hackersword 7y ago
  The client is just an electron app (ie a very thin wrapper around a webpage). One of the more glaring examples is unable to monitor inactivity and set away status correctly.

AaronFriel 7y ago

If anyone from Mattermost is listening, it would be wonderful if they offered the whitelabel deployment (for SSO) of apps as a service. For a startup without any presence on the Apple or Google app stores or specific mobile needs, it would be amazing to have someone package that up for enterprise customers and take care of keeping the app up to date.

crispyporkbites 7y ago
Why would Mattermost do this and not a specific provider?
- AaronFriel 7y ago
  That depends on what you mean by "provider", I suppose. Google is not going to be interested in doing this, I suppose a consultancy or MSP could offer this as a service if they resell Mattermost, but I don't know if Mattermost has that sort of sales network or system. On the other hand, for enterprise plan users it would make sense to rely on Mattermost for app distribution, and they have the expertise to publish the apps and ensure they're approved in the respective stores. Would a reseller or MSP necessarily have that competency? I come from the IT world where the answer would definitely be "no", but I could see it being part of contracted out work. Who owns the app then after that contract is up?

hartator 7y ago

I am very disappointed by Slack decision to remove screen sharing. We won't be paying customers from now on. Screenhero was an awesome product. I don't get why they are killing it.

duxup 7y ago
Screen sharing products seem to be finicky or massive out of control and hard to use apps. Maybe there is a technical reason screen sharing is so wonky.

Improvotter 7y ago

I'm using Mattermost for communicating with one team and I absolutely hate it. It feels so completely unfinished, like it's some kind of proof-of-concept? I don't mean to diss on Mattermost, I'm actually very excited to see them getting funding as Slack has like their name implies: slacking. What has Slack done over these past few years? Exactly, nothing! I don't mean that good software needs to keep updating, no not at all. It's just Slack can improve so much and it's just sitting there. I am really looking forward to replacing Slack with something else. For all of the people going to suggest Matrix or something else to me, hold your breath. The reason I haven't switched is because communities haven't switched and neither have companies.

alphagrep12345 7y ago

I don't get it. What's the need for an open source slack alternative?

pas 7y ago
Unlimited message retention. Different bells and whistles.
thiht 7y ago
Self hosting
parent5446 7y ago
It's because Slack is closed source.