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I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Am I really the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, and see my multiple c

I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Am I really the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, and see my multiple conversations on 27" screen, as opposed to one and a half inches of no-feedback glass surface? :-/ I went to Signal site, downloaded the Windows app, and once installed, it asks me to link my phone. No option for any other signup. NOwhere in the download process or on main site does it warn me that this is a phone-only app. The desktop app itself simply starts to a "Connect your phone" screen with no explanation why I have to do it, whether there are or aren't alternatives, etc. Nothing about this is remotely user friendly. I have half a dozen laptops, two phones, few tables at home alone; the notion that I must be crippled to only communicate via the smallest, least practical communication device I own; and then be horribly crippled in attaching one-at-a-time additional device but with crippling dependency on said phone... I guess I'm a negative focus group and completely out of touch with the realities of the world, but I cannot imagine or understand who wants to live like that :-/

detaro 7y ago
The Signal desktop apps at least are independent in that they do not require the phone after the initial setup, but yeah, it's annoying. They were far from perfect, but the multi-chat-protocol clients from the ICQ&co days had a lot going for them...
- NotSammyHagar 7y ago
  Having signal be tethered to a real phone number does give you a point to root your account around, and allow recovery. It must reduce spam, and it's always a way to find other users. But I do find it irritating that you can't have a virtual account too. When my phone busted, because I hadn't saved off all my security recovery info, it didn't matter that I had signal running on my laptop, etc, I had to reset my signal account on my new phone. It would have been nice if I could have "added" a new root account on my new phone from a working device. keybase allowed this.
  - Seenso 7y ago
    > Having signal be tethered to a real phone number does give you a point to root your account around, and allow recovery. It also makes it dead simple for most users, even nontechnical ones, to use and understand. They don't even have to do anything special, their Signal contact list is already bootstrapped when they install the app.
  - bityard 7y ago
    It is borderline trivial to steal someone else's phone number through social engineering and the systems underlying the world's GSM networks are very easy to spoof, MITM, and otherwise hijack with a minimum of equipment. It's crazy to me that with all of Signal's emphasis on security (being designed by one of the top security researchers in the world, no less), they chose to make tying your account to a phone number a requirement. I go very far out of my way to make sure that nothing important to me is tied to my phone number.
    - tialaramex 7y ago
      If you have and use Signal you can tell it not to let somebody else hijack Signal along with your phone number. You set a PIN, and then it pesters you for the PIN periodically to check you didn't go "Oh I'll just type some random digits and then moan later when I'm locked out, that'll be fine". So long as you keep entering the correct PIN periodically, Signal won't let anybody register with your phone number without knowing the PIN you've shown you remember. If you quit using Signal, after a while there haven't been any correct PIN entries for too long and anyone can claim that phone number again (and if they want, set a new PIN).
      - interestica 7y ago
        That introduces the problem of someone getting a new phone number. If the previous user had it tied to pin+signal it means that the number is essentially blacklisted.
        JeremyNT 7y ago
IshKebab 7y ago
Just in case you are seriously wondering why you have to connect your phone, it's because the web interface is basically a convenient interface for your phone. WhatsApp works exactly the same way. It works pretty well. Presumably it is because synchronizing conversations across devices while using end to end encryption is really difficult. You could give up end to end encryption but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't like that either.
- 0xb100db1ade 7y ago
  Nope. Once you sync your cryptographic keys with your desktop application, the phone is no longer needed. WhatsApp sends messages through the phone. Signal Desktop does not.
- vbezhenar 7y ago
  Why do I hate to give up end to end encryption? My end is PC, encrypt that. If I want a shared message history, it's understandable that I have to perform some kind of synchronization between PC and phone to, but it should be optional feature. I don't even want it, personally.
  - Freak_NL 7y ago
    If you get to use it just your personal computer (any modern OS) without a smartphone, than you would also get to choose your own identifier. For Facebook (WhatsApp) this is a non-starter, because your phone number is a way better identifier to link your profiles and sell your eyeballs to advertisers, so it will stay a requirement. On a PC you could even have multiple accounts on the same device, which is not good value for advertisers either (one device per person makes it easier to correlate various data sources and track you). No idea why Signal doesn't enable us to use their tool without a smartphone. It makes it look a bit dodgy from a software freedom perspective.
all2 7y ago
> I have half a dozen laptops, two phones, few tables at home alone; ... I'm dreaming of a messaging system with end-points that consume a Plan9 style file-system. Each device mounts the file-system, et voila you can send and receive messages from any device that has the FS mounted. Generally I want to hack the Android kernel so that it uses the Plan9 style FS so that I can not worry about the how-where-why of syncing docs-photos-music-etc between sundry devices. I say "Plan9 style FS" because the Plan9 FS requires some host server, some single end-point for file storage. I'm dreaming of a FS that negotiates storage (perhaps using an LRU policy) between a network of devices (ie, my phone, my laptop, maybe a DO droplet or something on AWS). Sharing could be encrypted blocks (to obscure discrete binaries), perhaps using the bit torrent protocol? I know there are software packages that do what I'm talking about, but it isn't easy. I can't just scan a QR code (and then do the two-factor authentication) and have access to my files.
- solarkraft 7y ago
  You probably already know about Syncthing, which is a block-based peer-to-peer file synchronization solution. There are some talks in the project to add a way to only download files when actually accessed and there's no real-time communication, but I imagine it would not be insanely hard to add. It already somewhat offers the adding-process you describe.
  - all2 7y ago
    I had syncthing running on my phone and my laptop. I've had lots of issues with the sync actually working; ie it will hang on certain kinds of Jupyter notebook files, or it will ignore my images directory completely. I'm sure I've had other issues... Anyway, I gave up trying to get it to work because sending myself emails or using GDrive has less friction. I've been fascinated by usability for a long time. It seems that many high-brow projects (see plan9 and others) aren't very interested in usability by the general population. Not you and me, but Joe(lene)-Schmoe who doesn't have a clue about the innards of their phone. They just want their stuff here (on there phone) and there (on their computer). I want that too. I guess I want to make neat and useful tech approachable to many. I even have an idea to monetize the above FS: a single page application that automatically spins up VMs that provide encrypted nodes for your personal network. A byproduct of that is a web access point to your stuff that doesn't (shouldn't) go down. This is important because, if you're like me, all your nodes are wireless and run on battery and therefore could leave the network at any time.
thibiitodwyek 7y ago
> The desktop app itself simply starts to a "Connect your phone" screen Presumably that is because it is the only device with the requisite cryptographic keys?
davidw 7y ago
I am pretty happy with whatever Google calls its chat/hangouts thing these days, as I can send SMS's from my browser or chat via either a browser or my phone, and it's all pretty transparent. I want nothing to do with tech I can only use on my phone.
- tw04 7y ago
  But it's not encypted. And Google keeps threatening to kill it.
  - davidw 7y ago
    Yes, those are good points, but kind of tangential to mine. I really don't understand where Google is going with its chat thing, as I find it just about perfect for what I need.
- thekyle 7y ago
  The desktop version of Signal works very similarly to Android Messenger. Although Signal doesn't require the phone to be turned on to send receive messages.
- MAGZine 7y ago
  Hangouts is actually one of the best messaging apps to this day, I'll be sad when it disappears. I love being able to send and receive messages from my PC and phone, seamlessly. And, probably the best part of all? All of my messages are searchable using Google's excellent search in my gmail inbox. I've been able to find specific messages I remember sending years ago. No other messaging platform does this (at least, not well).
  - jahlove 7y ago
    I wish they would have added search to the mobile app. Too busy creating endless new mobile-only chat apps I guess.
    - davidw 7y ago
sorenjan 7y ago
That's exactly why Google Allo was a no go for me from the start. I'm using Telegram now, and their desktop client is great. Any mobile first solution is uninteresting for me, and that includes hacks where messages are routed from my computer via my phone.
- Craighead 7y ago
  Yuck at VK integration
- jahlove 7y ago
  Google Hangouts is pretty great, so of course Google is discontinuing it. I always have email open anyway, so its very convenient to fire of a chat while I'm on desktop.
  - sorenjan 7y ago
    I've used Hangouts since it was Google talk and used xmpp. I used several different multi protocol programs to connect to Google talk, Microsoft messenger, ICQ at the same time. Things where different back then. Now I try to get as many as possible to get away from at least Google and Facebook services.
- interestica 7y ago
  Encryption only available for mobile chats, right? And "secret" chats won't be available for the desktop view.
  - metadaemon 7y ago
    This is unfortunately correct, but I still prefer Telegram to other chat clients.
  - sorenjan 7y ago
    All chats are encrypted to and from the client, but only secret chats are encrypted end to end. And yes, secret chats are only available on mobile. https://telegram.org/faq#q-so-how-do-you-encrypt-data https://telegram.org/faq#q-so-how-do-you-encrypt-data
AceJohnny2 7y ago
> it asks me to link my phone It's because Signal chose to make the phone number their main identifier, not some random username or email. (I can't immediately find their rationale for that decision, but I think it had to do with making the service available to those millions that have a cell phone but no email, and usernames make it hard to auto-populate contacts whereas phone numbers can be cross-referenced with your contact list)
- tptacek 7y ago
  The rationale is this: messaging platforms are social networks, all of them are based on contact lists, and all mainstream messengers besides Signal store contact lists on servers. Those contact lists are incredibly valuable metadata, probably the most valuable intelligence target outside of message contents themselves. Signal uses phone numbers because Signal users already have contact lists outside of Signal. By piggybacking on phone contacts, Signal can avoid storing metadata about who's sending encrypted messages to whom. Compare that with Wire, which is a fine system, but which also effectively stores a log of every pair of users that have spoken to each other on the platform, in a database, constantly available. Not having that database is the win for phone number identifiers. Meanwhile, while the loss from that decision is painfully felt by people who communicate on platforms like HN, it's hardly felt at all by ordinary users, who already communicate primarily on platforms that use phone numbers as identifiers. WhatsApp, the most popular messenger in the world, was created as a pin-compatible replacement for SMS. Signal's decision here is not the decision I would have made, because I loathe phone numbers (and, for that matter, messaging people on my phone). But it was a smart, principled decision, and almost certainly the right one; I'd decide otherwise because protecting the most people in the most effective way might be my stated preference, but it wouldn't be the preference my own actions would reveal.
  - gojomo 7y ago
    I don't see how account-based systems, or Wire in particular, must "effectively store[] a log of every pair of users that have spoken to each other on the platform, in a database, constantly available". As far as I can tell – and just like Signal – they just need to hold (destination-ID, blob) for all as-yet undelivered messages. And if the destination-ID isn't a phone-number, it's harder to correlated with other extant databases of (phone-number -> IMEI) or (phone-number -> person). That is, this undelivered-log has less metadata in an account-based system than a phone-number-based system. I get that using the contact-lists, and the constant re-uploading of contact-lists, is great for Signal's bootstrapping. Anchoring IDs to phone numbers might also work as an abuse throttle. But I don't see how it minimizes metadata. Can you clarify?
bitxbitxbitcoin 7y ago
You aren't alone. I would much prefer that desktop instant messaging experience, too.
rahuldottech 7y ago
> I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Matrix/riot is the solution. Works wonderfully across platforms. https://riot.im/ https://riot.im/
- tptacek 7y ago
  I understand why people like Matrix and wish that project the best of luck, but it is not comparable to Signal as privacy technology. The last time Matrix was discussed here, just a few weeks ago, the network couldn't even require support for E2E encryption, apparently because too many of its clients didn't have it working. How long have people been watching and discussing Matrix on HN? It feels like a long time. It's 2020 now. It has never been possible to send an unencrypted message on Signal. People should use Matrix if they like Matrix. But they should not be suggesting to random strangers that Matrix is as safe as Signal.
  - iudqnolq 7y ago
    > It has never been possible to send an unencrypted message on Signal. Irrelevant nitpick, but hold down on the send button and select "Insecure SMS"
    - tptacek 7y ago
      There is no button I seem to be able to long-press on iOS Signal that gives me that option. Can you be more specific?
      - tialaramex 7y ago
        They're talking about the Android app. In Android the application which sends messages can be replaced, and so Signal offers to replace it, as a result it needs to be able to send old-fashioned SMS messages when the correspondent doesn't seem to have Signal. Your iPhone doesn't let anybody do that, just like it doesn't let Mozilla provide a different web browser and so on. This has upsides and downsides for security which I'm sure you've already thought about, for me it's a good reason not to own an iPhone, but the rationale for the opposite decision is sound.
tptacek 7y ago
You're not the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, and I share your preference. But you should recognize that you are in a relatively small minority of users, and that Signal has made the eminently rational decision to focus its efforts on the majority use case. If you look at Signal as a response to SMS, WhatsApp, and iMessage --- the messaging platforms most people use --- its most controversial decisions make a whole lot more sense. Doing that requires people to accept that Signal wasn't necessarily designed for them, and that in order to decisively solve the problems it has set out to solve, it's had to make tradeoffs that cut against what other people want. That's unusual for a startup! Startups usually try to make everyone happy! But then, Signal isn't a startup. Meanwhile: you're ultimately going to get the Signal that you want. A desktop-based, phone-untethered Signal seems inevitable; in fact, it seems like we might get it not that long from now. But we're certainly not going to get it on the timescale that message board people want to get it on.
- chimeracoder 7y ago
  I agree with most of your comment, but > That's unusual for a startup! Startups usually try to make everyone happy! I don't know about that. Most startups - and especially the successful ones - have few qualms with ignoring "edge case users" and focusing on what they perceive to be their target market.
  - lilactown 7y ago
    I believe the OP was being sarcastic there.
- xorcist 7y ago
  > A desktop-based, phone-untethered Signal seems inevitable That one might be called "jabber".
  - azinman2 7y ago
    Not anymore than it should be called ICQ. The XMPP protocol does not share any of the privacy-oriented roots of signal.
cutler 7y ago
I don't understand your point. You have full-size keyboard access through Signal's desktop app on your laptops paired to your phone so what's the problem?
- fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
  Isn't the desktop app a recent development? Or maybe I only recently discovered it.
  - dewey 7y ago
    It's been around since 2015, so pretty much from the start: https://signal.org/blog/signal-desktop/ https://signal.org/blog/signal-desktop/
    - ghostpepper 7y ago
      Any idea about how the security posture changes? I would expect some significant tradeoffs are required to make all your messages appear in your browser
      - dewey 7y ago
        I haven't used it in a while but I think it's probably similar to WhatsApp where it basically just tunnels it through your phone without actually running a Signal client on your machine.
        mfwoods 7y ago
        It's not, once linked the desktop client can be used independently of your phone.
      - simpss 7y ago
        i'm not 100% sure how it works, but it seems to sync some messages. Not working perfectly as my desktop client does not have the full history from a chat, even though my phone does. It only has some of the messages from where the desktop client was first started.
kitsunesoba 7y ago
It’s precisely because iMessage and Telegram don’t treat the desktop as a second class afterthought that I use them for messaging instead of Signal.
- novia 7y ago
  Has Telegram started providing encrypted chats to the desktop apps? Last I checked, you could only engage in encrypted chats from the mobile app.
  - fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
    I just checked. If it has, I can't see how to do it.
    - Stubb 7y ago
      Click on the pencil & paper icon next to the search window. One of the options is "New Secret Chat".
      - fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
        I don't see it. I'm using Version 1.9.9
        eukgoekoko 7y ago
        If you're using Mac you could find this feature in https://macos.telegram.org/ https://macos.telegram.org/ (v 5.9.1) This is really confusing they have two official desktop clients for MacOs.
- ac29 7y ago
  Can I create an iMessage account using a Windows or Linux desktop? Or are those second class desktop platforms?
- maqp 7y ago
intopieces 7y ago
In what way is the dependency on the phone crippling? It's a one time sign-up with the phone. You don't have to use it after that.
- rabidrat 7y ago
  I don't have a smartphone that can install apps. SMS would be one thing, requiring a smartphone is, indeed, crippling.
  - input_sh 7y ago
    I guess you could install it in an emulator and enter the code you receive via SMS in it during the setup phase.
    - dependenttypes 7y ago
      Emulated phones get a phone number?
      - tialaramex 7y ago
        No. The emulated phone in this proposal is a way to run the Signal Android app. During enrollment Signal uses SMS to close the loop on a claimed phone number. The OPs real phone doesn't run Android but it can receive SMS messages so it gets that SMS. The next screen in the emulated app says if the SMS code wasn't filled out automatically then please type it in, and that's what you do. Tada, now your Signal account is linked to your quite real phone number for a dumb phone.
    - Marsymars 7y ago
      One could also install it on any non-phone device (iPod, tablet, etc.) that supports app installation.
rabboRubble 7y ago
Signal for desktop.
- superkuh 7y ago
  Requires a phone number.
frereubu 7y ago
Forgive the slight tease, but this just sounds like “I cannot fathom why <thing I dislike> is more popular than <thing I like>.” It’s really as simple as more people being comfortable with <thing I dislike>. From there it’s relatively easy to come up with reasons - an example in this case might be that people really enjoy sending messages / photos when on the move in situations where getting a laptop out is impractical.
- NikolaNovak 7y ago
  1. Teases are always forgiven :) 2. But, I feel quite the opposite is the case here. I fully comprehend that somebody may want to use phone as their primary communication device (my wife, for one:). More power to them and I would never get in their way. I will use it myself when on the move. On the other hand, so many people seem to get a "deer in headlights" look when trying to imagine my use case of using laptop to communicate. App like Google Hangouts supports phone and laptop as equal first-class citizens. It makes EVERYbody happy. It's a great superset of all use-cases. You can share your pictures on the phone and type your long messages or parallelize conversations on a laptop. Everybody happy! :) Signal and Whatsapp, I will counter, do not solve the problems or userss case that we on HN think it does. NOBODY I know using Whatsapp has a clue that it uses end-to-end encryption, nor do they care. I would venture that's the case for majority of the 2bil userbase. All they know is they never had to create an account or password, which makes it simple to use. It is actually the "lack" of security that's the biggest selling feature (though of course, at this point, the network effect is the single biggest selling feature over anything else; my family uses Whatsapp because everybody they know uses Whatsapp - QED).
ryanmercer 7y ago
>Am I really the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, I pay for pushbullet just so I can use my keyboard when I'm sitting at my desk at home and have for 2ish years.
- NikolaNovak 7y ago
  OK, that's useful... how's your experience in the real world? I'm eager to check it out :) edit: Whopsie; unsurprisingly, no iOS app (background: iPhone is forced upon us by work; reason #2138 I don't like messaging / using the phone :P ). Might still be useful for my personal devices though...
  - ryanmercer 7y ago
    If you were using an Android device frequently I'd say it's worth it at the current price, I actually cancelled it a few months ago trying to save money and lasted about a half hour before I reactivated. When I first installed it they had it (they might still) so you could have a free tier for a small amount of SMS messages. I used it for 3 or 4 and then paid for it right then. My only other option at the time was to use Hangouts (gross). My Chromebox has had Google Messenger support for quite some time now but I don't want to use Messenger on my phone as I prefer Textra. Aside from using it for SMS via my Chromebox (or less frequently my Win10 lapto, Chromebox is my daily driver) at my desk I also: - use it to quickly send someone a photo from reddit/imgur just by saving it and attaching it instead of firing off the link (so I know they actually look at it) - Use it to send YouTube videos and pages from my phone to my browser at home and it just opens it in a new tab there. I actually use this several times a week for when it's something I want to give my attention to but am out and about doing something. - To mirror phone notifications in my Chromebox/laptop browser. You can select individual apps to do this. I mostly just use this to quickly scan messages if I'm watching something on YouTube or in a Reddit thread. It also works fine with Grammarly on my Chromebox (Dunno about the Win10 machine) which isn't a big deal but I like getting anything I type on that machine counted in my weekly Grammarly stats because I'm a nerd. My only complaint is sometimes SMS will just hang sending from your browser, if you unlock your phone they then send. I imagine I could fix this by changing the appropriate power saving features in Android but it's not a big deal, just a half second finger swipe on my phone. It can be insignificantly buggy sometimes, it'll be blank in Chrome but maybe 90% of the time if I just click out of it and then click back into it, voila. The other 10% of the time switching tabs corrects it. That could just be my Chromebox though, I've never see it do it in Win10.
monkin 7y ago
Your comment is a single reason I use Telegram. WhatsApp does the same, you can't even see web version without phone, and I'm probably the only one in the world, who doesn't have any apps on it... ;)
marssaxman 7y ago
Signal is not a replacement for the sort of chat app you might use on a computer; it is a replacement for the unencrypted SMS you might otherwise be using on your phone.
- int_19h 7y ago
  That's a very artificial distinction. What's the difference between SMS and chat these days? Not only that, but you have e.g. iMessage and Hangouts (especially on Google Fi, where the desktop client can send and receive SMS directly), which blurs the line even further.
leonidasv 7y ago
For me, the biggest problem lies in the fact that your messages are local. And phones will always have less capacity than dedicated storage servers. What bothers me the most is when I have to resend a photo or file to a friend of mine on WhatsApp because he changed his phone and didn't want to install the WhatsApp backup from cloud. Or you simply had to delete things to free up space on your phone. Or I've lost something because I didn't want to have my phone's storage full of cat memes or something. The way WhatsApp makes "backups" is totally dysfunctional. Instead of using a database with support for indexes and full-text search, it simply creates a kind of zip file with a proprietary protocol that forces you to download the entire backup again to search for a single file or message. I hate having to use WhatsApp and I try to bring people to Telegram as much as I can. It is as if we have gone back in time and gone back to MSN Messenger, only worse.
KerrickStaley 7y ago
This comment is misleading. You can use Signal through the desktop app, you just have to register through the phone app first. Maybe they will allow registration through desktop in the future, but this is how it works right now.
- virtue3 7y ago
  The only downside is that you can only message other signal users via the desktop app. At least last time I tried. This has caused me to use googles messages app via their web so that I can type on my keyboard :( And oddly enough the "your phone" app on windows 10, which is frankly, quite good.
et2o 7y ago
It’s not phone only. I use it all the time with my phone in a different room.
jelling 7y ago
The only things certain in life are death, taxes, and the top comment on HN being someone complaining about how the product doesn't fit their very specific use case.
- creddit 7y ago
  It’s either that or attempting to trivialize the content of the link to let everyone know that they could do the same thing in 4hrs after work on a Wednesday.
Razengan 7y ago
Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. I still do. The AIMs and MSNs and Skypes came and went. Now it's the WhatsApps and Discords. Every one of them trying to reinvent the wheel the should have just been fixed 20 years ago. But why has nobody sat down and said, "Here's a better IRC, here's a reference client, here's the source code, knock yourself out." It's still not too late you know. In fact, there has never been a better time (and need) to revamp those classic platforms for the modern era. With services like GitHub and AWS, it should be easier than ever to collaborate on building ever better clients and hosting servers etc. Here's my wishlist for improvements over what I can remember of IRC: • Mandatory encryption for client-to-server and direct peer-to-peer. • Server-side chat history, spam filtering and DOS resistance. • Ability to send binary data like images, audio, video and arbitrary files in public channels and private chats. • Message deletion and temporary messages. Basically a decentralized Discord (which is a centralized IRC to begin with.)
- 6581 7y ago
  https://ircv3.net/ https://ircv3.net/
- ObsoleteNerd 7y ago
  > Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. Is being worked on now: https://irc.com/ https://irc.com/
- HereBeBeasties 7y ago
  It sounds like you are looking for Matrix.org (and Riot.im)
- Marsymars 7y ago
  Doesn't answer your protocol question, but Textual is a really fantastic IRC client for macOS with various modern capabilities.
- tatersolid 7y ago
  > Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. For the same reason SMTP hasn’t meaningfully improved in the last 25 or so years. It’s an ossified protocol because of all the competing implementations. Moxie is right about that bit. HTTP and HTML are slightly different because of the huge dollars backing implementers, but there are still significant features not in one or more if the major browsers, and adoption of HTML5 was actually pretty slow. Basically, open standards sound awesome, but they quickly get frozen in time due to compatibility constraints.
naavis 7y ago
A big portion of WhatsApp users do not own any other device than a mobile phone, or do not actively use one.
tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
> I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Because they work. Not ideally, but reliably. I can pick up my phone, and actually message my friends, and I don't have to debug why my open source Linux client isn't compatible with their open source Windows client, or their XMPP server doesn't want to talk to my XMPP server, or figure out which identifier they're using today. Signal takes away choice, and delivers a product that works. Which beats a product that is theoretically "better" (multi-device support, desktop support, ...) but in practice cumbersome or just not up to the task (e.g. because my friends aren't using that messenger, or OMEMO messages are not decryptable because someone mismanaged their key, ...) Moxie made all the right choices, even and especially where unpopular: Aggressive action against alternative clients to keep their existence marginal and ensure a consistently good user experience, phone numbers as identifiers to overcome the network effect, etc. In order to be useful, a messenger has to support mobile - I will want to talk to my friends when I'm on my way to meet them. So for a desktop messenger it's either flawless multi-device support or failure, and the former just doesn't seem to be achievable yet. A desktop-only messenger is useless because it doesn't meet my needs when I most need it; a mobile-only messenger is a bit annoying, but works 100% of the time, even when I'm using a desktop, because my phone is also nearby.
- chubs 7y ago
  You make very good points about the tradeoffs they avoid :) I'd be satisfied if they could do some form of eg bluetooth connection between a desktop app and your phone to give a limited desktop experience, however. I don't think that'd be impossible, similar to how whatsapp web really just proxies to your phone (well, best I can tell that's how it works)
  - dbrgn 7y ago
    Threema Web uses WebRTC data channels to establish a direct connection between phone and browser: https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-web/ https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-web/ Definitely possible (but quite complex in practice).
  - tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
StreamBright 7y ago
keybase is your friend
kome 7y ago
same here. i just don't understand this obsession with cellphones. and that's also why i use telegram.
anigbrowl 7y ago
You need a phone to set up Signal (mainly to prevent spam) but once you've done so you need never use it again if you choose not to. I use the desktop version most of the time. It does lag a few steps behind the phone version though, because most people aren't using a 1.5" screen, and want to have secure communication in the field as well as at home.
aloukissas 7y ago
It works great on desktop! It doesn't even need to tunnel traffic via your phone like WhatsApp does.
baryphonic 7y ago
I use Signal heavily, mostly on desktop. It would be more accurate to say that Signal registration is mobile-only. Once registered, you can never touch your phone again and everything will work. I've tried Telegram, WhatsApp, Hangouts, Facebook Messenger, iMessage. Signal has been the only one so far that I have been satisfied with because it: * Supports end-to-end encryption (and "disappearing" messages) * Has desktop and mobile apps that can be used independently (after registration at least; WhatsApp appears to require your phone to be on and near the desktop for the desktop app to work) * Distributes messages to all Signal clients (Telegram was nearly unusable due to this problem - I had to mentally remember where the conversation was when switching between desktop and mobile) * Doesn't have some sort of highly constrained user experience that requires using a social media platform or requires using a specific web browser (this has been a real problem with Hangouts and Facebook Messenger since they stopped supporting XMPP - RIP Adium) * Supports mainstream desktop and mobile operating systems (iMessage fails at this, despite Apple's promises in the last decade) * Has feature parity with other major chat services (this is the only weakness of Signal, but these days I can't think of a feature on WhatsApp or Telegram that isn't on Signal) I agree that I wish they would steamline the registration so that you don't have to go through a somewhat convoluted process to get started, but it really is not a phone-only app. Desktop is a full first-class citizen after the initial fixed cost. I think that's the price they may pay by being a non-profit - maybe the marketing isn't exactly what Facebook/Google/Apple/<pick your own DataVortexCorp> can afford. EDIT: Oh, I guess I should have mentioned Skype, but no thanks. Sorry, Microsoft, just no.
- elagost 7y ago
  You do have to touch your phone for every desktop client you link, and if you reinstall or bounce between machines, you encounter this a lot. Infrequently, the link just screws up and you have to 'relink' the desktop client, again requiring the phone. No way to log back in without the phone. Really my only complaint with an otherwise perfect tool.
  - baryphonic 7y ago
    Agreed. I'm hoping the article is correct and they're working on a method to handle login/registration that doesn't require registration/linking via phone, and doesn't leave a "bricked" account.
zelly 7y ago
The younger generation does not own full fledged desktops or even laptops in many cases. Two thumbs are the only input method they know. The same applies to the developing world. If you use messengers with 10 fingers, you're probably a global 1%. All that matters in this space is user count, not quality of users, so I understand why they neglect the desktop apps.
- glouwbug 7y ago
  I forsee comp sci students being unable to type, or atleast type very slowly, in 10 years
ninguem2 7y ago
What you want is Google Hangouts but, unfortunately, nobody uses that.
petre 7y ago
Wire works without a phone mostly because you don't have to use a phone number as login. I have an e-mail based account for instance, but I think you have to add contacts manually, pretty much like skype.
ur-whale 7y ago
I'm 100% with you. But the normies aren't. And there's an awful lot of them.
dboreham 7y ago
>it asks me to link my phone. No option for any other signup. NOwhere in the download process or on main site does it warn me that this is a phone-only app. It isn't a phone-only app. I think it wants a phone in the flow above to authorize your desktop install. They use the phone, and its E.164 address as the root of trust. But the app works just fine on Windows.
superkuh 7y ago
Not only is it a phone only application but it literally requires a phone number which is your ID for the service.
rolltiide 7y ago
haptic feedback and swipe address all of those criticisms for like, an entire decade you just use a single thumb to type by playing connect the dots between the letters, and the device does provide physical feedback regarding being out of touch, have you tried this? iOS only recently added native swipe
datguacdoh 7y ago
I used to feel this way too, but then was talking to family that was visiting from other parts of the world where no one they know owns a laptop or desktop computer, but everyone has a phone. For much of the next wave of computer users in rising countrues around the world, the phone is the first and only computing device that a person owns. They grew up on smaller screens and digital keyboards and have no care to move to what they consider a less convenient form factor. It really helped me better understand why some of these global messaging platforms are focused so much on phone based systems.
msh 7y ago
Most of the time the computer I sit in front of is my company provided work computer. That is not a piece of hardware that I would use to access my (non work related) secure messaging platform.

detaro 7y ago

The Signal desktop apps at least are independent in that they do not require the phone after the initial setup, but yeah, it's annoying. They were far from perfect, but the multi-chat-protocol clients from the ICQ&co days had a lot going for them...

NotSammyHagar 7y ago
Having signal be tethered to a real phone number does give you a point to root your account around, and allow recovery. It must reduce spam, and it's always a way to find other users. But I do find it irritating that you can't have a virtual account too. When my phone busted, because I hadn't saved off all my security recovery info, it didn't matter that I had signal running on my laptop, etc, I had to reset my signal account on my new phone. It would have been nice if I could have "added" a new root account on my new phone from a working device. keybase allowed this.
- Seenso 7y ago
  > Having signal be tethered to a real phone number does give you a point to root your account around, and allow recovery. It also makes it dead simple for most users, even nontechnical ones, to use and understand. They don't even have to do anything special, their Signal contact list is already bootstrapped when they install the app.
- bityard 7y ago
  It is borderline trivial to steal someone else's phone number through social engineering and the systems underlying the world's GSM networks are very easy to spoof, MITM, and otherwise hijack with a minimum of equipment. It's crazy to me that with all of Signal's emphasis on security (being designed by one of the top security researchers in the world, no less), they chose to make tying your account to a phone number a requirement. I go very far out of my way to make sure that nothing important to me is tied to my phone number.
  - tialaramex 7y ago
    If you have and use Signal you can tell it not to let somebody else hijack Signal along with your phone number. You set a PIN, and then it pesters you for the PIN periodically to check you didn't go "Oh I'll just type some random digits and then moan later when I'm locked out, that'll be fine". So long as you keep entering the correct PIN periodically, Signal won't let anybody register with your phone number without knowing the PIN you've shown you remember. If you quit using Signal, after a while there haven't been any correct PIN entries for too long and anyone can claim that phone number again (and if they want, set a new PIN).
    - interestica 7y ago
      That introduces the problem of someone getting a new phone number. If the previous user had it tied to pin+signal it means that the number is essentially blacklisted.
      - JeremyNT 7y ago

IshKebab 7y ago

Just in case you are seriously wondering why you have to connect your phone, it's because the web interface is basically a convenient interface for your phone. WhatsApp works exactly the same way. It works pretty well. Presumably it is because synchronizing conversations across devices while using end to end encryption is really difficult. You could give up end to end encryption but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't like that either.

0xb100db1ade 7y ago
Nope. Once you sync your cryptographic keys with your desktop application, the phone is no longer needed. WhatsApp sends messages through the phone. Signal Desktop does not.
vbezhenar 7y ago
Why do I hate to give up end to end encryption? My end is PC, encrypt that. If I want a shared message history, it's understandable that I have to perform some kind of synchronization between PC and phone to, but it should be optional feature. I don't even want it, personally.
- Freak_NL 7y ago
  If you get to use it just your personal computer (any modern OS) without a smartphone, than you would also get to choose your own identifier. For Facebook (WhatsApp) this is a non-starter, because your phone number is a way better identifier to link your profiles and sell your eyeballs to advertisers, so it will stay a requirement. On a PC you could even have multiple accounts on the same device, which is not good value for advertisers either (one device per person makes it easier to correlate various data sources and track you). No idea why Signal doesn't enable us to use their tool without a smartphone. It makes it look a bit dodgy from a software freedom perspective.

all2 7y ago

> I have half a dozen laptops, two phones, few tables at home alone; ... I'm dreaming of a messaging system with end-points that consume a Plan9 style file-system. Each device mounts the file-system, et voila you can send and receive messages from any device that has the FS mounted. Generally I want to hack the Android kernel so that it uses the Plan9 style FS so that I can not worry about the how-where-why of syncing docs-photos-music-etc between sundry devices. I say "Plan9 style FS" because the Plan9 FS requires some host server, some single end-point for file storage. I'm dreaming of a FS that negotiates storage (perhaps using an LRU policy) between a network of devices (ie, my phone, my laptop, maybe a DO droplet or something on AWS). Sharing could be encrypted blocks (to obscure discrete binaries), perhaps using the bit torrent protocol? I know there are software packages that do what I'm talking about, but it isn't easy. I can't just scan a QR code (and then do the two-factor authentication) and have access to my files.

solarkraft 7y ago
You probably already know about Syncthing, which is a block-based peer-to-peer file synchronization solution. There are some talks in the project to add a way to only download files when actually accessed and there's no real-time communication, but I imagine it would not be insanely hard to add. It already somewhat offers the adding-process you describe.
- all2 7y ago
  I had syncthing running on my phone and my laptop. I've had lots of issues with the sync actually working; ie it will hang on certain kinds of Jupyter notebook files, or it will ignore my images directory completely. I'm sure I've had other issues... Anyway, I gave up trying to get it to work because sending myself emails or using GDrive has less friction. I've been fascinated by usability for a long time. It seems that many high-brow projects (see plan9 and others) aren't very interested in usability by the general population. Not you and me, but Joe(lene)-Schmoe who doesn't have a clue about the innards of their phone. They just want their stuff here (on there phone) and there (on their computer). I want that too. I guess I want to make neat and useful tech approachable to many. I even have an idea to monetize the above FS: a single page application that automatically spins up VMs that provide encrypted nodes for your personal network. A byproduct of that is a web access point to your stuff that doesn't (shouldn't) go down. This is important because, if you're like me, all your nodes are wireless and run on battery and therefore could leave the network at any time.

thibiitodwyek 7y ago

> The desktop app itself simply starts to a "Connect your phone" screen Presumably that is because it is the only device with the requisite cryptographic keys?

davidw 7y ago

I am pretty happy with whatever Google calls its chat/hangouts thing these days, as I can send SMS's from my browser or chat via either a browser or my phone, and it's all pretty transparent. I want nothing to do with tech I can only use on my phone.

tw04 7y ago
But it's not encypted. And Google keeps threatening to kill it.
- davidw 7y ago
  Yes, those are good points, but kind of tangential to mine. I really don't understand where Google is going with its chat thing, as I find it just about perfect for what I need.
thekyle 7y ago
The desktop version of Signal works very similarly to Android Messenger. Although Signal doesn't require the phone to be turned on to send receive messages.
MAGZine 7y ago
Hangouts is actually one of the best messaging apps to this day, I'll be sad when it disappears. I love being able to send and receive messages from my PC and phone, seamlessly. And, probably the best part of all? All of my messages are searchable using Google's excellent search in my gmail inbox. I've been able to find specific messages I remember sending years ago. No other messaging platform does this (at least, not well).
- jahlove 7y ago
  I wish they would have added search to the mobile app. Too busy creating endless new mobile-only chat apps I guess.
  - davidw 7y ago

sorenjan 7y ago

That's exactly why Google Allo was a no go for me from the start. I'm using Telegram now, and their desktop client is great. Any mobile first solution is uninteresting for me, and that includes hacks where messages are routed from my computer via my phone.

Craighead 7y ago
Yuck at VK integration
jahlove 7y ago
Google Hangouts is pretty great, so of course Google is discontinuing it. I always have email open anyway, so its very convenient to fire of a chat while I'm on desktop.
- sorenjan 7y ago
  I've used Hangouts since it was Google talk and used xmpp. I used several different multi protocol programs to connect to Google talk, Microsoft messenger, ICQ at the same time. Things where different back then. Now I try to get as many as possible to get away from at least Google and Facebook services.
interestica 7y ago
Encryption only available for mobile chats, right? And "secret" chats won't be available for the desktop view.
- metadaemon 7y ago
  This is unfortunately correct, but I still prefer Telegram to other chat clients.
- sorenjan 7y ago
  All chats are encrypted to and from the client, but only secret chats are encrypted end to end. And yes, secret chats are only available on mobile. https://telegram.org/faq#q-so-how-do-you-encrypt-data https://telegram.org/faq#q-so-how-do-you-encrypt-data

AceJohnny2 7y ago

> it asks me to link my phone It's because Signal chose to make the phone number their main identifier, not some random username or email. (I can't immediately find their rationale for that decision, but I think it had to do with making the service available to those millions that have a cell phone but no email, and usernames make it hard to auto-populate contacts whereas phone numbers can be cross-referenced with your contact list)

tptacek 7y ago
The rationale is this: messaging platforms are social networks, all of them are based on contact lists, and all mainstream messengers besides Signal store contact lists on servers. Those contact lists are incredibly valuable metadata, probably the most valuable intelligence target outside of message contents themselves. Signal uses phone numbers because Signal users already have contact lists outside of Signal. By piggybacking on phone contacts, Signal can avoid storing metadata about who's sending encrypted messages to whom. Compare that with Wire, which is a fine system, but which also effectively stores a log of every pair of users that have spoken to each other on the platform, in a database, constantly available. Not having that database is the win for phone number identifiers. Meanwhile, while the loss from that decision is painfully felt by people who communicate on platforms like HN, it's hardly felt at all by ordinary users, who already communicate primarily on platforms that use phone numbers as identifiers. WhatsApp, the most popular messenger in the world, was created as a pin-compatible replacement for SMS. Signal's decision here is not the decision I would have made, because I loathe phone numbers (and, for that matter, messaging people on my phone). But it was a smart, principled decision, and almost certainly the right one; I'd decide otherwise because protecting the most people in the most effective way might be my stated preference, but it wouldn't be the preference my own actions would reveal.
- gojomo 7y ago
  I don't see how account-based systems, or Wire in particular, must "effectively store[] a log of every pair of users that have spoken to each other on the platform, in a database, constantly available". As far as I can tell – and just like Signal – they just need to hold (destination-ID, blob) for all as-yet undelivered messages. And if the destination-ID isn't a phone-number, it's harder to correlated with other extant databases of (phone-number -> IMEI) or (phone-number -> person). That is, this undelivered-log has less metadata in an account-based system than a phone-number-based system. I get that using the contact-lists, and the constant re-uploading of contact-lists, is great for Signal's bootstrapping. Anchoring IDs to phone numbers might also work as an abuse throttle. But I don't see how it minimizes metadata. Can you clarify?

bitxbitxbitcoin 7y ago

You aren't alone. I would much prefer that desktop instant messaging experience, too.

rahuldottech 7y ago

> I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Matrix/riot is the solution. Works wonderfully across platforms. https://riot.im/ https://riot.im/

tptacek 7y ago
I understand why people like Matrix and wish that project the best of luck, but it is not comparable to Signal as privacy technology. The last time Matrix was discussed here, just a few weeks ago, the network couldn't even require support for E2E encryption, apparently because too many of its clients didn't have it working. How long have people been watching and discussing Matrix on HN? It feels like a long time. It's 2020 now. It has never been possible to send an unencrypted message on Signal. People should use Matrix if they like Matrix. But they should not be suggesting to random strangers that Matrix is as safe as Signal.
- iudqnolq 7y ago
  > It has never been possible to send an unencrypted message on Signal. Irrelevant nitpick, but hold down on the send button and select "Insecure SMS"
  - tptacek 7y ago
    There is no button I seem to be able to long-press on iOS Signal that gives me that option. Can you be more specific?
    - tialaramex 7y ago
      They're talking about the Android app. In Android the application which sends messages can be replaced, and so Signal offers to replace it, as a result it needs to be able to send old-fashioned SMS messages when the correspondent doesn't seem to have Signal. Your iPhone doesn't let anybody do that, just like it doesn't let Mozilla provide a different web browser and so on. This has upsides and downsides for security which I'm sure you've already thought about, for me it's a good reason not to own an iPhone, but the rationale for the opposite decision is sound.

tptacek 7y ago

You're not the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, and I share your preference. But you should recognize that you are in a relatively small minority of users, and that Signal has made the eminently rational decision to focus its efforts on the majority use case. If you look at Signal as a response to SMS, WhatsApp, and iMessage --- the messaging platforms most people use --- its most controversial decisions make a whole lot more sense. Doing that requires people to accept that Signal wasn't necessarily designed for them, and that in order to decisively solve the problems it has set out to solve, it's had to make tradeoffs that cut against what other people want. That's unusual for a startup! Startups usually try to make everyone happy! But then, Signal isn't a startup. Meanwhile: you're ultimately going to get the Signal that you want. A desktop-based, phone-untethered Signal seems inevitable; in fact, it seems like we might get it not that long from now. But we're certainly not going to get it on the timescale that message board people want to get it on.

chimeracoder 7y ago
I agree with most of your comment, but > That's unusual for a startup! Startups usually try to make everyone happy! I don't know about that. Most startups - and especially the successful ones - have few qualms with ignoring "edge case users" and focusing on what they perceive to be their target market.
- lilactown 7y ago
  I believe the OP was being sarcastic there.
xorcist 7y ago
> A desktop-based, phone-untethered Signal seems inevitable That one might be called "jabber".
- azinman2 7y ago
  Not anymore than it should be called ICQ. The XMPP protocol does not share any of the privacy-oriented roots of signal.

cutler 7y ago

I don't understand your point. You have full-size keyboard access through Signal's desktop app on your laptops paired to your phone so what's the problem?

fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
Isn't the desktop app a recent development? Or maybe I only recently discovered it.
- dewey 7y ago
  It's been around since 2015, so pretty much from the start: https://signal.org/blog/signal-desktop/ https://signal.org/blog/signal-desktop/
  - ghostpepper 7y ago
    Any idea about how the security posture changes? I would expect some significant tradeoffs are required to make all your messages appear in your browser
    - dewey 7y ago
      I haven't used it in a while but I think it's probably similar to WhatsApp where it basically just tunnels it through your phone without actually running a Signal client on your machine.
      - mfwoods 7y ago
        It's not, once linked the desktop client can be used independently of your phone.
    - simpss 7y ago
      i'm not 100% sure how it works, but it seems to sync some messages. Not working perfectly as my desktop client does not have the full history from a chat, even though my phone does. It only has some of the messages from where the desktop client was first started.

kitsunesoba 7y ago

It’s precisely because iMessage and Telegram don’t treat the desktop as a second class afterthought that I use them for messaging instead of Signal.

novia 7y ago
Has Telegram started providing encrypted chats to the desktop apps? Last I checked, you could only engage in encrypted chats from the mobile app.
- fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
  I just checked. If it has, I can't see how to do it.
  - Stubb 7y ago
    Click on the pencil & paper icon next to the search window. One of the options is "New Secret Chat".
    - fnordfnordfnord 7y ago
      I don't see it. I'm using Version 1.9.9
      - eukgoekoko 7y ago
        If you're using Mac you could find this feature in https://macos.telegram.org/ https://macos.telegram.org/ (v 5.9.1) This is really confusing they have two official desktop clients for MacOs.
ac29 7y ago
Can I create an iMessage account using a Windows or Linux desktop? Or are those second class desktop platforms?
maqp 7y ago

intopieces 7y ago

In what way is the dependency on the phone crippling? It's a one time sign-up with the phone. You don't have to use it after that.

rabidrat 7y ago
I don't have a smartphone that can install apps. SMS would be one thing, requiring a smartphone is, indeed, crippling.
- input_sh 7y ago
  I guess you could install it in an emulator and enter the code you receive via SMS in it during the setup phase.
  - dependenttypes 7y ago
    Emulated phones get a phone number?
    - tialaramex 7y ago
      No. The emulated phone in this proposal is a way to run the Signal Android app. During enrollment Signal uses SMS to close the loop on a claimed phone number. The OPs real phone doesn't run Android but it can receive SMS messages so it gets that SMS. The next screen in the emulated app says if the SMS code wasn't filled out automatically then please type it in, and that's what you do. Tada, now your Signal account is linked to your quite real phone number for a dumb phone.
  - Marsymars 7y ago
    One could also install it on any non-phone device (iPod, tablet, etc.) that supports app installation.

rabboRubble 7y ago

Signal for desktop.

superkuh 7y ago
Requires a phone number.

frereubu 7y ago

Forgive the slight tease, but this just sounds like “I cannot fathom why <thing I dislike> is more popular than <thing I like>.” It’s really as simple as more people being comfortable with <thing I dislike>. From there it’s relatively easy to come up with reasons - an example in this case might be that people really enjoy sending messages / photos when on the move in situations where getting a laptop out is impractical.

NikolaNovak 7y ago
1. Teases are always forgiven :) 2. But, I feel quite the opposite is the case here. I fully comprehend that somebody may want to use phone as their primary communication device (my wife, for one:). More power to them and I would never get in their way. I will use it myself when on the move. On the other hand, so many people seem to get a "deer in headlights" look when trying to imagine my use case of using laptop to communicate. App like Google Hangouts supports phone and laptop as equal first-class citizens. It makes EVERYbody happy. It's a great superset of all use-cases. You can share your pictures on the phone and type your long messages or parallelize conversations on a laptop. Everybody happy! :) Signal and Whatsapp, I will counter, do not solve the problems or userss case that we on HN think it does. NOBODY I know using Whatsapp has a clue that it uses end-to-end encryption, nor do they care. I would venture that's the case for majority of the 2bil userbase. All they know is they never had to create an account or password, which makes it simple to use. It is actually the "lack" of security that's the biggest selling feature (though of course, at this point, the network effect is the single biggest selling feature over anything else; my family uses Whatsapp because everybody they know uses Whatsapp - QED).

ryanmercer 7y ago

>Am I really the only person who prefers to type on a full-sized keyboard, I pay for pushbullet just so I can use my keyboard when I'm sitting at my desk at home and have for 2ish years.

NikolaNovak 7y ago
OK, that's useful... how's your experience in the real world? I'm eager to check it out :) edit: Whopsie; unsurprisingly, no iOS app (background: iPhone is forced upon us by work; reason #2138 I don't like messaging / using the phone :P ). Might still be useful for my personal devices though...
- ryanmercer 7y ago
  If you were using an Android device frequently I'd say it's worth it at the current price, I actually cancelled it a few months ago trying to save money and lasted about a half hour before I reactivated. When I first installed it they had it (they might still) so you could have a free tier for a small amount of SMS messages. I used it for 3 or 4 and then paid for it right then. My only other option at the time was to use Hangouts (gross). My Chromebox has had Google Messenger support for quite some time now but I don't want to use Messenger on my phone as I prefer Textra. Aside from using it for SMS via my Chromebox (or less frequently my Win10 lapto, Chromebox is my daily driver) at my desk I also: - use it to quickly send someone a photo from reddit/imgur just by saving it and attaching it instead of firing off the link (so I know they actually look at it) - Use it to send YouTube videos and pages from my phone to my browser at home and it just opens it in a new tab there. I actually use this several times a week for when it's something I want to give my attention to but am out and about doing something. - To mirror phone notifications in my Chromebox/laptop browser. You can select individual apps to do this. I mostly just use this to quickly scan messages if I'm watching something on YouTube or in a Reddit thread. It also works fine with Grammarly on my Chromebox (Dunno about the Win10 machine) which isn't a big deal but I like getting anything I type on that machine counted in my weekly Grammarly stats because I'm a nerd. My only complaint is sometimes SMS will just hang sending from your browser, if you unlock your phone they then send. I imagine I could fix this by changing the appropriate power saving features in Android but it's not a big deal, just a half second finger swipe on my phone. It can be insignificantly buggy sometimes, it'll be blank in Chrome but maybe 90% of the time if I just click out of it and then click back into it, voila. The other 10% of the time switching tabs corrects it. That could just be my Chromebox though, I've never see it do it in Win10.

monkin 7y ago

Your comment is a single reason I use Telegram. WhatsApp does the same, you can't even see web version without phone, and I'm probably the only one in the world, who doesn't have any apps on it... ;)

marssaxman 7y ago

Signal is not a replacement for the sort of chat app you might use on a computer; it is a replacement for the unencrypted SMS you might otherwise be using on your phone.

int_19h 7y ago
That's a very artificial distinction. What's the difference between SMS and chat these days? Not only that, but you have e.g. iMessage and Hangouts (especially on Google Fi, where the desktop client can send and receive SMS directly), which blurs the line even further.

leonidasv 7y ago

For me, the biggest problem lies in the fact that your messages are local. And phones will always have less capacity than dedicated storage servers. What bothers me the most is when I have to resend a photo or file to a friend of mine on WhatsApp because he changed his phone and didn't want to install the WhatsApp backup from cloud. Or you simply had to delete things to free up space on your phone. Or I've lost something because I didn't want to have my phone's storage full of cat memes or something. The way WhatsApp makes "backups" is totally dysfunctional. Instead of using a database with support for indexes and full-text search, it simply creates a kind of zip file with a proprietary protocol that forces you to download the entire backup again to search for a single file or message. I hate having to use WhatsApp and I try to bring people to Telegram as much as I can. It is as if we have gone back in time and gone back to MSN Messenger, only worse.

KerrickStaley 7y ago

This comment is misleading. You can use Signal through the desktop app, you just have to register through the phone app first. Maybe they will allow registration through desktop in the future, but this is how it works right now.

virtue3 7y ago
The only downside is that you can only message other signal users via the desktop app. At least last time I tried. This has caused me to use googles messages app via their web so that I can type on my keyboard :( And oddly enough the "your phone" app on windows 10, which is frankly, quite good.

et2o 7y ago

It’s not phone only. I use it all the time with my phone in a different room.

jelling 7y ago

The only things certain in life are death, taxes, and the top comment on HN being someone complaining about how the product doesn't fit their very specific use case.

creddit 7y ago
It’s either that or attempting to trivialize the content of the link to let everyone know that they could do the same thing in 4hrs after work on a Wednesday.

Razengan 7y ago

Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. I still do. The AIMs and MSNs and Skypes came and went. Now it's the WhatsApps and Discords. Every one of them trying to reinvent the wheel the should have just been fixed 20 years ago. But why has nobody sat down and said, "Here's a better IRC, here's a reference client, here's the source code, knock yourself out." It's still not too late you know. In fact, there has never been a better time (and need) to revamp those classic platforms for the modern era. With services like GitHub and AWS, it should be easier than ever to collaborate on building ever better clients and hosting servers etc. Here's my wishlist for improvements over what I can remember of IRC: • Mandatory encryption for client-to-server and direct peer-to-peer. • Server-side chat history, spam filtering and DOS resistance. • Ability to send binary data like images, audio, video and arbitrary files in public channels and private chats. • Message deletion and temporary messages. Basically a decentralized Discord (which is a centralized IRC to begin with.)

6581 7y ago
https://ircv3.net/ https://ircv3.net/
ObsoleteNerd 7y ago
> Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. Is being worked on now: https://irc.com/ https://irc.com/
HereBeBeasties 7y ago
It sounds like you are looking for Matrix.org (and Riot.im)
Marsymars 7y ago
Doesn't answer your protocol question, but Textual is a really fantastic IRC client for macOS with various modern capabilities.
tatersolid 7y ago
> Eons ago I wondered why the IRC and NNTP protocols weren't being improved. For the same reason SMTP hasn’t meaningfully improved in the last 25 or so years. It’s an ossified protocol because of all the competing implementations. Moxie is right about that bit. HTTP and HTML are slightly different because of the huge dollars backing implementers, but there are still significant features not in one or more if the major browsers, and adoption of HTML5 was actually pretty slow. Basically, open standards sound awesome, but they quickly get frozen in time due to compatibility constraints.

naavis 7y ago

A big portion of WhatsApp users do not own any other device than a mobile phone, or do not actively use one.

tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago

> I cannot fathom the proliferation of phone-only messaging apps. Because they work. Not ideally, but reliably. I can pick up my phone, and actually message my friends, and I don't have to debug why my open source Linux client isn't compatible with their open source Windows client, or their XMPP server doesn't want to talk to my XMPP server, or figure out which identifier they're using today. Signal takes away choice, and delivers a product that works. Which beats a product that is theoretically "better" (multi-device support, desktop support, ...) but in practice cumbersome or just not up to the task (e.g. because my friends aren't using that messenger, or OMEMO messages are not decryptable because someone mismanaged their key, ...) Moxie made all the right choices, even and especially where unpopular: Aggressive action against alternative clients to keep their existence marginal and ensure a consistently good user experience, phone numbers as identifiers to overcome the network effect, etc. In order to be useful, a messenger has to support mobile - I will want to talk to my friends when I'm on my way to meet them. So for a desktop messenger it's either flawless multi-device support or failure, and the former just doesn't seem to be achievable yet. A desktop-only messenger is useless because it doesn't meet my needs when I most need it; a mobile-only messenger is a bit annoying, but works 100% of the time, even when I'm using a desktop, because my phone is also nearby.

chubs 7y ago
You make very good points about the tradeoffs they avoid :) I'd be satisfied if they could do some form of eg bluetooth connection between a desktop app and your phone to give a limited desktop experience, however. I don't think that'd be impossible, similar to how whatsapp web really just proxies to your phone (well, best I can tell that's how it works)
- dbrgn 7y ago
  Threema Web uses WebRTC data channels to establish a direct connection between phone and browser: https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-web/ https://github.com/threema-ch/threema-web/ Definitely possible (but quite complex in practice).
- tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago

StreamBright 7y ago

keybase is your friend

kome 7y ago

same here. i just don't understand this obsession with cellphones. and that's also why i use telegram.

anigbrowl 7y ago

You need a phone to set up Signal (mainly to prevent spam) but once you've done so you need never use it again if you choose not to. I use the desktop version most of the time. It does lag a few steps behind the phone version though, because most people aren't using a 1.5" screen, and want to have secure communication in the field as well as at home.

aloukissas 7y ago

It works great on desktop! It doesn't even need to tunnel traffic via your phone like WhatsApp does.

baryphonic 7y ago

I use Signal heavily, mostly on desktop. It would be more accurate to say that Signal registration is mobile-only. Once registered, you can never touch your phone again and everything will work. I've tried Telegram, WhatsApp, Hangouts, Facebook Messenger, iMessage. Signal has been the only one so far that I have been satisfied with because it: * Supports end-to-end encryption (and "disappearing" messages) * Has desktop and mobile apps that can be used independently (after registration at least; WhatsApp appears to require your phone to be on and near the desktop for the desktop app to work) * Distributes messages to all Signal clients (Telegram was nearly unusable due to this problem - I had to mentally remember where the conversation was when switching between desktop and mobile) * Doesn't have some sort of highly constrained user experience that requires using a social media platform or requires using a specific web browser (this has been a real problem with Hangouts and Facebook Messenger since they stopped supporting XMPP - RIP Adium) * Supports mainstream desktop and mobile operating systems (iMessage fails at this, despite Apple's promises in the last decade) * Has feature parity with other major chat services (this is the only weakness of Signal, but these days I can't think of a feature on WhatsApp or Telegram that isn't on Signal) I agree that I wish they would steamline the registration so that you don't have to go through a somewhat convoluted process to get started, but it really is not a phone-only app. Desktop is a full first-class citizen after the initial fixed cost. I think that's the price they may pay by being a non-profit - maybe the marketing isn't exactly what Facebook/Google/Apple/<pick your own DataVortexCorp> can afford. EDIT: Oh, I guess I should have mentioned Skype, but no thanks. Sorry, Microsoft, just no.

elagost 7y ago
You do have to touch your phone for every desktop client you link, and if you reinstall or bounce between machines, you encounter this a lot. Infrequently, the link just screws up and you have to 'relink' the desktop client, again requiring the phone. No way to log back in without the phone. Really my only complaint with an otherwise perfect tool.
- baryphonic 7y ago
  Agreed. I'm hoping the article is correct and they're working on a method to handle login/registration that doesn't require registration/linking via phone, and doesn't leave a "bricked" account.

zelly 7y ago

The younger generation does not own full fledged desktops or even laptops in many cases. Two thumbs are the only input method they know. The same applies to the developing world. If you use messengers with 10 fingers, you're probably a global 1%. All that matters in this space is user count, not quality of users, so I understand why they neglect the desktop apps.

glouwbug 7y ago
I forsee comp sci students being unable to type, or atleast type very slowly, in 10 years

ninguem2 7y ago

What you want is Google Hangouts but, unfortunately, nobody uses that.

petre 7y ago

Wire works without a phone mostly because you don't have to use a phone number as login. I have an e-mail based account for instance, but I think you have to add contacts manually, pretty much like skype.

ur-whale 7y ago

I'm 100% with you. But the normies aren't. And there's an awful lot of them.

dboreham 7y ago

>it asks me to link my phone. No option for any other signup. NOwhere in the download process or on main site does it warn me that this is a phone-only app. It isn't a phone-only app. I think it wants a phone in the flow above to authorize your desktop install. They use the phone, and its E.164 address as the root of trust. But the app works just fine on Windows.

superkuh 7y ago

Not only is it a phone only application but it literally requires a phone number which is your ID for the service.

rolltiide 7y ago

haptic feedback and swipe address all of those criticisms for like, an entire decade you just use a single thumb to type by playing connect the dots between the letters, and the device does provide physical feedback regarding being out of touch, have you tried this? iOS only recently added native swipe

datguacdoh 7y ago

I used to feel this way too, but then was talking to family that was visiting from other parts of the world where no one they know owns a laptop or desktop computer, but everyone has a phone. For much of the next wave of computer users in rising countrues around the world, the phone is the first and only computing device that a person owns. They grew up on smaller screens and digital keyboards and have no care to move to what they consider a less convenient form factor. It really helped me better understand why some of these global messaging platforms are focused so much on phone based systems.

msh 7y ago

Most of the time the computer I sit in front of is my company provided work computer. That is not a piece of hardware that I would use to access my (non work related) secure messaging platform.