9 ms·

Signal AppImage for Linux

74 points by maverick74 6y ago

jonquark 6y ago
I don't use the AppImage, but I do use the unofficial Fedora package and it seems to work well. https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/luminoso/Signal-Desktop/ https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/luminoso/Signal-Desk...
teekert 6y ago
I never really liked AppImages. Until I got one recently that asked if it was allowed to be in my menu... Game changer! Now, if they would just automatically move to a ~/apps folder, be executable and indeed, in the menu. My love for AppImage would grow orders of magnitude. Even more if they could self update. Right now, snaps are the only universal packaging format that really gives me a smooth experience (install experience that is.)
- devenblake 6y ago
  You could always just rig up a couple Bash aliases and change where your menu works. Say for example appimg() { chmod +x $1; mv $1 ~/apps/ } and then bind a key sequence to `$(ls ~/apps/ | dmenu)`.
  - incrudible 6y ago
    Not to dismiss your reply, but I've always thought that the "just open the terminal and..." kind of solution that is always brought up is holding Desktop Linux back. There's a workaround for almost everything. Wherever there is a workaround, the problem becomes less severe. As a result, it is less likely to get fixed. There is nothing preventing AppImages to work like app containers on Mac OS except lack of integration that comes out-of-the-box. Advocating for that integration becomes more difficult, when you can "just open the terminal and...".
    - vinay427 6y ago
      I posted this above, but at least for me, this project seems to do the trick: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher I did use a terminal to install the AUR package on my system, however. ;)
- gibspaulding 6y ago
  There is a snap for Signal as well (signal-desktop). So far it's been working for me!
- vinay427 6y ago
  This solves this problem for me quite well: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher It asks whether an AppImage should be integrated (with .desktop files, etc.) upon launching one and does everything automatically, even on my system running Arch+i3 where I except little to work automatically.
- 1_player 6y ago
  How are snaps universal and smoother than Flatpak? For once, they're only really supported by Ubuntu and not its derivatives.
  - loudtieblahblah 6y ago
    imho - after the insertion of flatpak, appimage, snaps, and in some cases dockerimages... i fail to see what problems we've solved. it seems to me we've just duplicated the problems of competing packaging standards across distros, except now they all take up more resources and disk space than before. it may have made a couple of devs lives easier, but the average linux desktop now is messier than a Windows XP SP1 desktop. We have apps from official repos, downloaded DEBS and/or RPMs, flatpak apps, appimages that dont' integrate into menus, snaps (if you're locked into Ubuntu), maybe a docker image or two. Nevermind half these apps are probably Electron based regardless of their crappy packaging.
    - scaladev 6y ago
      Just switch to Arch. I know it's become a meme distro, but the AUR really is amazing. I don't have AppImages, snaps, Flatpak, or anything of the sort on any of my systems. Everything is either installed from the official repositories, or automatically built as proper packages and installed the same way.
      - mbushey 6y ago
        This is exactly what I did. Snap's are basically docker gone wrong. Snaps are sandboxed, blocking access to NFS shares which I use extensively. Under Ubuntu, Chromium is usually broke (apt-get installs a deb that then installs a snap); You have to install either a debian .deb or use a PPA to make it work. I love that Ubuntu is directly including ZFS, but the distro has gotten so bad that I don't want to go near it anymore. Arch works, and works well.
    - akvadrako 6y ago
      > imho - after the insertion of flatpak, appimage, snaps, and in some cases dockerimages... > i fail to see what problems we've solved. Any of those can be installed on most big distros, so you only need to release one for your app. Though I would use only docker for services and only flatpak or appimage for apps. Snap is proprietary; only Canonical runs a server.
- zaarn 6y ago
  If you use the KDE Discover, it's pretty smooth as well. Searched for "Signal", found the app, clicked on install, waited, then clicked on open. Signal App opened. Uses Flatpak in the Background and handles updates too.
- whatatita 6y ago
  I've used AppImageLauncher to do just that. When an AppImage is opened with AIL, it moves it to a configurable ~/app directory and creates a "start menu" entry for it. I've never though about it but I guess it also makes them executable, since I've never had to do that myself. It doesn't handle removing the AppImage, but you can always just delete the file from ~/apps.
  - maverick74 6y ago
    For reference, what whatatita is talking about is at: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher/releases https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher/releases ;)
- elric 6y ago
  I've been a big fan of AppImage since I discovered that Firejail has AppImage support. Makes it super easy to do, for instance, bandwidth shaping for a single application, or to disallow network traffic etc.
pojntfx 6y ago
There is also a Flatpak: https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal
popey 6y ago
There's also a snap which I've been maintaining for ~2.5 years. It's seeing quite a surge in downloads (unsurprisingly) over the last week or so. https://snapcraft.io/signal-desktop https://snapcraft.io/signal-desktop
- MrDresden 6y ago
  Been using it now for a year and a half, so thank you for your effort! It is much appreciated :)
- Jayschwa 6y ago
  Thank you for maintaining the snap. I once reported a problem with it a couple years ago and was impressed at how quickly you responded and fixed it.
upofadown 6y ago
I don't know why people insist on running this particular siloed encrypted instant messenger everywhere in every way. There are tons of these things out there. Since none of them interoperate anyway all you need to do is pick one that everyone in your group can run. Kind of an upside to very unfortunate situation...
- cheph 6y ago
  I find it particularly annoying that it inherits almost all of the worst features of WhatsApp which people are supposedly fleeing, such as being completely centralized and tied to your phone number.
  - darkwater 6y ago
    People fleeing WhatsApp is basically fleeing from it because it is owned by Facebook. So it's usually for political reasons (especially in the USA) and/or for privacy concerns. A minority of tech-savvy users are leaving it for the reasons you say.
  - Dumbdo 6y ago
    Not exactly sure what you are talking about. People are fleeing from Whatsapp because it's owned by Facebook (which has one of the worst privacy reputations), because it's closed source and because facebook can replace your E2EE private key if they want so the E2EE is pretty useless. Facebook could also use the metadata if they want, which is pretty valuable. Signal on the other hand is a nonprofit run by trusted people like Moxie Marlinspike, it's accessible to casual (non-IT) users as well (unlike XMPP) and it's fully open-source. It also minimizes metadata, like with the Sealed Sender functionality.
    - icy 6y ago
      > trusted people like Moxie Marlinspike Just out of curiosity and not challenging: what makes Moxie trustworthy?
      - 6y ago
cheph 6y ago
For the life of me I can't see why people use this over Matrix. But if it was because you want an AppImage for the client, then here: https://appimage.github.io/element/ https://appimage.github.io/element/
- Dumbdo 6y ago
  Because in contrast to Matrix it looks much more accessible to the average user. Not all of my friends are in IT and want to/are able to use matrix. Signal is also nonprofit, fully opensource and minimizes metadata to a minimal amount (e.g. [0]), so it might not be as good as Matrix, but it's certainly not as bad as Whatsapp. [0] https://signal.org/blog/sealed-sender/ https://signal.org/blog/sealed-sender/
- popey 6y ago
  I find Matrix to be super abrasive to use. Weird popups asking me about encryption, missing messages, and a confusing UI. I'm a nerd, and I find it baffling. Feels like it needs a UI stripdown. Something like Telegram is way more intuitive to use, but obviously not fully free on the backend.
  - arnoooooo 6y ago
    Fluffychat is a Matrix client with a much simpler UI. I've been testing it for a few days. It's still not to the level of Telegram, but it looks promising.
    - hiq 6y ago
      The problem is that having multiple clients for a given platform is confusing for non-technical users. Most users will give up after they have failed with the first client they found, especially if alternatives like WhatsApp etc. are easier to use. That's the first time I see this client mentioned. Maybe in a few years, the dust will have settled and there'll be a prominent Matrix client that's the obvious choice for most users. I don't think it'll reach widespread use before that.
    - kevincox 6y ago
ZeroCool2u 6y ago
I've been using Signal for a few years now. Got most of my friends and actually all of my coworkers to switch. The one thing that really bums me out is that the desktop app is another Electron app. At the time of initial development and even now, there's really been no good cross platform way to build a desktop app with a team as small as Signal's, but they recently had an AMA on reddit where I asked if they had considered migrating to a Flutter based desktop app in the future. Their answer was generally positive regarding Flutter, but also a fairly firm no to future migration, so it seems we're stuck with Electron unless something changes.
- meibo 6y ago
  This is what surprised me most, using Telegram next to Signal in the recent months - their Windows app is fully native and super fluid + speedy. It's really a night and day difference, I hope Signal devs will reconsider some time.
  - jakswa 6y ago
    Same deal on ubuntu/linux! For a year or so I've been really happy with Telegram's resource usage and snappiness.
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  I would donate specifically to an effort to develop a native Signal Mac app.
  - kop316 6y ago
    Donations are kind of a funny thing IMO. Some folks who develop for open source are not motivated by money, and may not even want it. I personally have been developing MMS to get it on the pinephone, and I don't think I would want anyone to donate to me. The main reason is now I feel like it obligates me to work and support people, versus now I do not feel any obligation. I get that I can ask for donations with no expectation in return, but I would still feel that way. I would offer if that is truly what you want, perhaps taking some of the first steps to get it going may be a lot more useful than donating. If you have the first steps done, it makes the goal much easier if others want to help. That is exactly what I have found wokring through my project. A lot of people come out the woodwork to help on smaller issues that they can tackle, but there was no large scale effort until I finally rolled up my sleeves to start.
brian_herman 6y ago
https://signal.org/donate/ https://signal.org/donate/ would maybe help so they can apply resources to this issue!
- distantsounds 6y ago
  donate to change one line of code in the build process? there are reasons other than finances that are getting in the way of this moving forward, i'm afraid.
hiccuphippo 6y ago
Is there some particular reason why it's not in the distros repositories or is it just a case of nobody has stepped up to do the work yet?
j1elo 6y ago
As a user, I love having a single executable file and not worrying about anything else like alien dependencies that will usually not work on my outdated distro. But from the developer point of view, I've seen some claiming that maintaining an AppImage is a PITA and pretty difficult / time consuming to get right: https://github.com/phw/peek/issues/502#issuecomment-587574333 https://github.com/phw/peek/issues/502#issuecomment-58757433...
duckfang 6y ago
There's some major issues with Signal right now. 1. Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? 2. Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. 3. Signal still demands/pesters the user to share the whole phonebook with Signal. Anyone who does gets notifications when their phonebook shows up on Signal. And when you show up on Signal, everybody else is also told you're there as well. (Massive domestic abuse issues here)
- Erlich_Bachman 6y ago
  You can't call 1.) an "issue with Signal". It is not even correct description. It is an issue with any messenger app on any device or OS that installs automatic updates of anything from CCP.
- UncleMeat 6y ago
  > Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? If you can't trust your OS then you've lost already. This complaint is also fun considering the number of people who yell about banks doing things like refusing to run if nonstandard keyboards are installed. > Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. The alternative appears to be "Signal knows which users you have communicated with", which is much worse. All sorts of interesting things can be obtained from the communication graph.
  - duckfang 6y ago
    > > Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? > If you can't trust your OS then you've lost already. This complaint is also fun considering the number of people who yell about banks doing things like refusing to run if nonstandard keyboards are installed. There are also open source and 3rd party repos (F-Droid) that could provide properly vetted soft keyboards. And I'd also mention that Signal is not available on F-Droid or Guardian Project's repo. And Signal can also run basic checks for sanity of the system, and loudly warn if things aren't as the application expects. > > Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. > The alternative appears to be "Signal knows which users you have communicated with", which is much worse. All sorts of interesting things can be obtained from the communication graph. All of the encrypted comms goes through their servers. They also prevent others from running federated Signal servers. That would lead that they have access to both who, where (ip address), how long (by length of encrypted data), and with whom. The same metadata was/is the basis of the NSA's spy projects. Metadata is just as important as the very content.
StavrosK 6y ago
Having an AppImage for Signal would be nice, but just yesterday I used kdocker to make it create an icon onto my system tray, which I don't think the AppImage would work with. Unfortunately Signal doesn't do this natively, so I have to keep the window open all the time (and my chats visible to passers-by). I'll pick kdocker for this one, I think.
alwdgxzubpxnzcy 6y ago
I believe AppImage does not have an update mechanism which would make it more likely users will end up outdated versions which contain security issues. That is why I am more in favor of flatpak.
- andrewmackrodt 6y ago
  It can be possible, JetBrains Toolbox seamlessly auto updates but I'm not sure how they achieved it. On the other hand, maybe it is not so easy, I wish use the rpcs3 AppImage and have never had success with it's built-in update feature. The AppImage documentation mentions auto updating an electron-builder image is possible: https://docs.appimage.org/packaging-guide/optional/updates.html#using-electron-builder https://docs.appimage.org/packaging-guide/optional/updates.h...
tapoxi 6y ago
There's also a Flatpak available here: https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal I wish Signal would officially adopt the Flatpak and AppImage versions. They are pretty widely used and depend on third-party build pipelines right now, which is a risk.
- meibo 6y ago
  Yeah, I was thinking this as well - the only official versions are for Debian-based repositories, feels a bit misguided to me for the "privacy and only privacy" messenger that probably has an essential userbase on Linux. The other messengers with the same amount of funding can do it and it's not a great amount of work, with the community being able to contribute to build scripts.
  - sdepablos 6y ago
    Don't you find Flatpacks and snaps a little slower? The overreliance of Ubuntu 20.04 on snaps was my reason to finally ditch it for something else
    - rhamzeh 6y ago
      Flatpaks, nope. At least nothing I could notice. Snaps, yes definitely, but mostly when there is a UI involved. I tend to prefer Flatpaks for apps with a UI. Snaps would have been good for CLI apps if Canonical would just give it a rest already, and allow them to be decentralized and stop pushing them so hard as if that would make us use them. So while I do sometimes use snap packages, I'd prefer not to.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - sdepablos 6y ago
        Thanks a lot rhamzeh!
rijoja 6y ago
Is it possible to use signal without having to have a smartphone app installed?
- meibo 6y ago
  No, you need an active smartphone and a phone number to sign up to Signal and register the desktop app at the moment. Maybe that'll change once they introduce usernames.
  - rijoja 6y ago
    hm, a bit annoying really. Wonder if a KVM + android x86 virtual machine would suffice. Will try it out when I have time...
    - sliken 6y ago
      You need something with a sim so they can call or SMS you.
- KitDuncan 6y ago
  Kinda. You can set up a matrix server and signal bridge. That's what I am doing with all chat applications.
  - rijoja 6y ago
    Hm apparently there is a CLI interface that can be used as well.
    - KitDuncan 6y ago
      True. I think the bridge even uses it behind the scenes. I am only running the bridge because I already have my matrix server with ever IM bridged through to it. It's pretty amazing to be honest.
vips7L 6y ago
I just wish the desktop app could send regular sms via my phone.
pmlnr 6y ago
signald[^1] + signal libpurple plugin[^2] (finch, pidgin, adium, bitlbee, etc) works beautifully. [^1]: https://gitlab.com/signald/signald https://gitlab.com/signald/signald [^2]: https://github.com/hoehermann/libpurple-signald https://github.com/hoehermann/libpurple-signald
- johnchristopher 6y ago
  Each time I tried something like that I had to authenticate every devices again. But maybe I am doing something wrong.
pr956738850 6y ago
~/apps isn't the answer. There is already a well-established convention for ~/bin. Applications should not be installed in user profile space. Many supported *nixes deprecate your touching system directories /bin, /usr etc and there's a well-established convention for placing added software in /opt, a filer share, removable media etc. An advantage of AppImage is that they don't change the system package database and can be run from /opt a share or removable media. Yes, there needs to be a mechanism for update of third-party applications. ~/apps isn't it. Imagine in a corporation that uses Linux desktops, 1,000 users clicking to update a third-party bloated electron app to ~/apps.

74 points by maverick74 6y ago

I don't use the AppImage, but I do use the unofficial Fedora package and it seems to work well. https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/luminoso/Signal-Desktop/ https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/luminoso/Signal-Desk...

teekert 6y ago

I never really liked AppImages. Until I got one recently that asked if it was allowed to be in my menu... Game changer! Now, if they would just automatically move to a ~/apps folder, be executable and indeed, in the menu. My love for AppImage would grow orders of magnitude. Even more if they could self update. Right now, snaps are the only universal packaging format that really gives me a smooth experience (install experience that is.)

devenblake 6y ago
You could always just rig up a couple Bash aliases and change where your menu works. Say for example appimg() { chmod +x $1; mv $1 ~/apps/ } and then bind a key sequence to `$(ls ~/apps/ | dmenu)`.
- incrudible 6y ago
  Not to dismiss your reply, but I've always thought that the "just open the terminal and..." kind of solution that is always brought up is holding Desktop Linux back. There's a workaround for almost everything. Wherever there is a workaround, the problem becomes less severe. As a result, it is less likely to get fixed. There is nothing preventing AppImages to work like app containers on Mac OS except lack of integration that comes out-of-the-box. Advocating for that integration becomes more difficult, when you can "just open the terminal and...".
  - vinay427 6y ago
    I posted this above, but at least for me, this project seems to do the trick: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher I did use a terminal to install the AUR package on my system, however. ;)
gibspaulding 6y ago
There is a snap for Signal as well (signal-desktop). So far it's been working for me!
vinay427 6y ago
This solves this problem for me quite well: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher It asks whether an AppImage should be integrated (with .desktop files, etc.) upon launching one and does everything automatically, even on my system running Arch+i3 where I except little to work automatically.
1_player 6y ago
How are snaps universal and smoother than Flatpak? For once, they're only really supported by Ubuntu and not its derivatives.
- loudtieblahblah 6y ago
  imho - after the insertion of flatpak, appimage, snaps, and in some cases dockerimages... i fail to see what problems we've solved. it seems to me we've just duplicated the problems of competing packaging standards across distros, except now they all take up more resources and disk space than before. it may have made a couple of devs lives easier, but the average linux desktop now is messier than a Windows XP SP1 desktop. We have apps from official repos, downloaded DEBS and/or RPMs, flatpak apps, appimages that dont' integrate into menus, snaps (if you're locked into Ubuntu), maybe a docker image or two. Nevermind half these apps are probably Electron based regardless of their crappy packaging.
  - scaladev 6y ago
    Just switch to Arch. I know it's become a meme distro, but the AUR really is amazing. I don't have AppImages, snaps, Flatpak, or anything of the sort on any of my systems. Everything is either installed from the official repositories, or automatically built as proper packages and installed the same way.
    - mbushey 6y ago
      This is exactly what I did. Snap's are basically docker gone wrong. Snaps are sandboxed, blocking access to NFS shares which I use extensively. Under Ubuntu, Chromium is usually broke (apt-get installs a deb that then installs a snap); You have to install either a debian .deb or use a PPA to make it work. I love that Ubuntu is directly including ZFS, but the distro has gotten so bad that I don't want to go near it anymore. Arch works, and works well.
  - akvadrako 6y ago
    > imho - after the insertion of flatpak, appimage, snaps, and in some cases dockerimages... > i fail to see what problems we've solved. Any of those can be installed on most big distros, so you only need to release one for your app. Though I would use only docker for services and only flatpak or appimage for apps. Snap is proprietary; only Canonical runs a server.
zaarn 6y ago
If you use the KDE Discover, it's pretty smooth as well. Searched for "Signal", found the app, clicked on install, waited, then clicked on open. Signal App opened. Uses Flatpak in the Background and handles updates too.
whatatita 6y ago
I've used AppImageLauncher to do just that. When an AppImage is opened with AIL, it moves it to a configurable ~/app directory and creates a "start menu" entry for it. I've never though about it but I guess it also makes them executable, since I've never had to do that myself. It doesn't handle removing the AppImage, but you can always just delete the file from ~/apps.
- maverick74 6y ago
  For reference, what whatatita is talking about is at: https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher/releases https://github.com/TheAssassin/AppImageLauncher/releases ;)
elric 6y ago
I've been a big fan of AppImage since I discovered that Firejail has AppImage support. Makes it super easy to do, for instance, bandwidth shaping for a single application, or to disallow network traffic etc.

pojntfx 6y ago

There is also a Flatpak: https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal

popey 6y ago

There's also a snap which I've been maintaining for ~2.5 years. It's seeing quite a surge in downloads (unsurprisingly) over the last week or so. https://snapcraft.io/signal-desktop https://snapcraft.io/signal-desktop

MrDresden 6y ago
Been using it now for a year and a half, so thank you for your effort! It is much appreciated :)
Jayschwa 6y ago
Thank you for maintaining the snap. I once reported a problem with it a couple years ago and was impressed at how quickly you responded and fixed it.

upofadown 6y ago

I don't know why people insist on running this particular siloed encrypted instant messenger everywhere in every way. There are tons of these things out there. Since none of them interoperate anyway all you need to do is pick one that everyone in your group can run. Kind of an upside to very unfortunate situation...

cheph 6y ago
I find it particularly annoying that it inherits almost all of the worst features of WhatsApp which people are supposedly fleeing, such as being completely centralized and tied to your phone number.
- darkwater 6y ago
  People fleeing WhatsApp is basically fleeing from it because it is owned by Facebook. So it's usually for political reasons (especially in the USA) and/or for privacy concerns. A minority of tech-savvy users are leaving it for the reasons you say.
- Dumbdo 6y ago
  Not exactly sure what you are talking about. People are fleeing from Whatsapp because it's owned by Facebook (which has one of the worst privacy reputations), because it's closed source and because facebook can replace your E2EE private key if they want so the E2EE is pretty useless. Facebook could also use the metadata if they want, which is pretty valuable. Signal on the other hand is a nonprofit run by trusted people like Moxie Marlinspike, it's accessible to casual (non-IT) users as well (unlike XMPP) and it's fully open-source. It also minimizes metadata, like with the Sealed Sender functionality.
  - icy 6y ago
    > trusted people like Moxie Marlinspike Just out of curiosity and not challenging: what makes Moxie trustworthy?
    - 6y ago

cheph 6y ago

For the life of me I can't see why people use this over Matrix. But if it was because you want an AppImage for the client, then here: https://appimage.github.io/element/ https://appimage.github.io/element/

Dumbdo 6y ago
Because in contrast to Matrix it looks much more accessible to the average user. Not all of my friends are in IT and want to/are able to use matrix. Signal is also nonprofit, fully opensource and minimizes metadata to a minimal amount (e.g. [0]), so it might not be as good as Matrix, but it's certainly not as bad as Whatsapp. [0] https://signal.org/blog/sealed-sender/ https://signal.org/blog/sealed-sender/
popey 6y ago
I find Matrix to be super abrasive to use. Weird popups asking me about encryption, missing messages, and a confusing UI. I'm a nerd, and I find it baffling. Feels like it needs a UI stripdown. Something like Telegram is way more intuitive to use, but obviously not fully free on the backend.
- arnoooooo 6y ago
  Fluffychat is a Matrix client with a much simpler UI. I've been testing it for a few days. It's still not to the level of Telegram, but it looks promising.
  - hiq 6y ago
    The problem is that having multiple clients for a given platform is confusing for non-technical users. Most users will give up after they have failed with the first client they found, especially if alternatives like WhatsApp etc. are easier to use. That's the first time I see this client mentioned. Maybe in a few years, the dust will have settled and there'll be a prominent Matrix client that's the obvious choice for most users. I don't think it'll reach widespread use before that.
  - kevincox 6y ago

ZeroCool2u 6y ago

I've been using Signal for a few years now. Got most of my friends and actually all of my coworkers to switch. The one thing that really bums me out is that the desktop app is another Electron app. At the time of initial development and even now, there's really been no good cross platform way to build a desktop app with a team as small as Signal's, but they recently had an AMA on reddit where I asked if they had considered migrating to a Flutter based desktop app in the future. Their answer was generally positive regarding Flutter, but also a fairly firm no to future migration, so it seems we're stuck with Electron unless something changes.

meibo 6y ago
This is what surprised me most, using Telegram next to Signal in the recent months - their Windows app is fully native and super fluid + speedy. It's really a night and day difference, I hope Signal devs will reconsider some time.
- jakswa 6y ago
  Same deal on ubuntu/linux! For a year or so I've been really happy with Telegram's resource usage and snappiness.
toomuchtodo 6y ago
I would donate specifically to an effort to develop a native Signal Mac app.
- kop316 6y ago
  Donations are kind of a funny thing IMO. Some folks who develop for open source are not motivated by money, and may not even want it. I personally have been developing MMS to get it on the pinephone, and I don't think I would want anyone to donate to me. The main reason is now I feel like it obligates me to work and support people, versus now I do not feel any obligation. I get that I can ask for donations with no expectation in return, but I would still feel that way. I would offer if that is truly what you want, perhaps taking some of the first steps to get it going may be a lot more useful than donating. If you have the first steps done, it makes the goal much easier if others want to help. That is exactly what I have found wokring through my project. A lot of people come out the woodwork to help on smaller issues that they can tackle, but there was no large scale effort until I finally rolled up my sleeves to start.

brian_herman 6y ago

https://signal.org/donate/ https://signal.org/donate/ would maybe help so they can apply resources to this issue!

distantsounds 6y ago
donate to change one line of code in the build process? there are reasons other than finances that are getting in the way of this moving forward, i'm afraid.

hiccuphippo 6y ago

Is there some particular reason why it's not in the distros repositories or is it just a case of nobody has stepped up to do the work yet?

j1elo 6y ago

As a user, I love having a single executable file and not worrying about anything else like alien dependencies that will usually not work on my outdated distro. But from the developer point of view, I've seen some claiming that maintaining an AppImage is a PITA and pretty difficult / time consuming to get right: https://github.com/phw/peek/issues/502#issuecomment-587574333 https://github.com/phw/peek/issues/502#issuecomment-58757433...

duckfang 6y ago

There's some major issues with Signal right now. 1. Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? 2. Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. 3. Signal still demands/pesters the user to share the whole phonebook with Signal. Anyone who does gets notifications when their phonebook shows up on Signal. And when you show up on Signal, everybody else is also told you're there as well. (Massive domestic abuse issues here)

Erlich_Bachman 6y ago
You can't call 1.) an "issue with Signal". It is not even correct description. It is an issue with any messenger app on any device or OS that installs automatic updates of anything from CCP.
UncleMeat 6y ago
> Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? If you can't trust your OS then you've lost already. This complaint is also fun considering the number of people who yell about banks doing things like refusing to run if nonstandard keyboards are installed. > Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. The alternative appears to be "Signal knows which users you have communicated with", which is much worse. All sorts of interesting things can be obtained from the communication graph.
- duckfang 6y ago
  > > Signal was used by Chinese dissidents and were whisked away by the CCP. The most likely proposed method was that the GBoard (google soft-keyboard) was "updated" with a poison update that uploaded everything typed. What defenses does Signal have against that? And will Signal warn against unverified GBoard updates that haven't been vetted? > If you can't trust your OS then you've lost already. This complaint is also fun considering the number of people who yell about banks doing things like refusing to run if nonstandard keyboards are installed. There are also open source and 3rd party repos (F-Droid) that could provide properly vetted soft keyboards. And I'd also mention that Signal is not available on F-Droid or Guardian Project's repo. And Signal can also run basic checks for sanity of the system, and loudly warn if things aren't as the application expects. > > Signal still demands your phone# to make an account. This by itself is unconscionable for an application that purports to be for security and privacy. > The alternative appears to be "Signal knows which users you have communicated with", which is much worse. All sorts of interesting things can be obtained from the communication graph. All of the encrypted comms goes through their servers. They also prevent others from running federated Signal servers. That would lead that they have access to both who, where (ip address), how long (by length of encrypted data), and with whom. The same metadata was/is the basis of the NSA's spy projects. Metadata is just as important as the very content.

StavrosK 6y ago

Having an AppImage for Signal would be nice, but just yesterday I used kdocker to make it create an icon onto my system tray, which I don't think the AppImage would work with. Unfortunately Signal doesn't do this natively, so I have to keep the window open all the time (and my chats visible to passers-by). I'll pick kdocker for this one, I think.

alwdgxzubpxnzcy 6y ago

I believe AppImage does not have an update mechanism which would make it more likely users will end up outdated versions which contain security issues. That is why I am more in favor of flatpak.

andrewmackrodt 6y ago
It can be possible, JetBrains Toolbox seamlessly auto updates but I'm not sure how they achieved it. On the other hand, maybe it is not so easy, I wish use the rpcs3 AppImage and have never had success with it's built-in update feature. The AppImage documentation mentions auto updating an electron-builder image is possible: https://docs.appimage.org/packaging-guide/optional/updates.html#using-electron-builder https://docs.appimage.org/packaging-guide/optional/updates.h...

tapoxi 6y ago

There's also a Flatpak available here: https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal https://flathub.org/apps/details/org.signal.Signal I wish Signal would officially adopt the Flatpak and AppImage versions. They are pretty widely used and depend on third-party build pipelines right now, which is a risk.

meibo 6y ago
Yeah, I was thinking this as well - the only official versions are for Debian-based repositories, feels a bit misguided to me for the "privacy and only privacy" messenger that probably has an essential userbase on Linux. The other messengers with the same amount of funding can do it and it's not a great amount of work, with the community being able to contribute to build scripts.
- sdepablos 6y ago
  Don't you find Flatpacks and snaps a little slower? The overreliance of Ubuntu 20.04 on snaps was my reason to finally ditch it for something else
  - rhamzeh 6y ago
    Flatpaks, nope. At least nothing I could notice. Snaps, yes definitely, but mostly when there is a UI involved. I tend to prefer Flatpaks for apps with a UI. Snaps would have been good for CLI apps if Canonical would just give it a rest already, and allow them to be decentralized and stop pushing them so hard as if that would make us use them. So while I do sometimes use snap packages, I'd prefer not to.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - sdepablos 6y ago
      Thanks a lot rhamzeh!

rijoja 6y ago

Is it possible to use signal without having to have a smartphone app installed?

meibo 6y ago
No, you need an active smartphone and a phone number to sign up to Signal and register the desktop app at the moment. Maybe that'll change once they introduce usernames.
- rijoja 6y ago
  hm, a bit annoying really. Wonder if a KVM + android x86 virtual machine would suffice. Will try it out when I have time...
  - sliken 6y ago
    You need something with a sim so they can call or SMS you.
KitDuncan 6y ago
Kinda. You can set up a matrix server and signal bridge. That's what I am doing with all chat applications.
- rijoja 6y ago
  Hm apparently there is a CLI interface that can be used as well.
  - KitDuncan 6y ago
    True. I think the bridge even uses it behind the scenes. I am only running the bridge because I already have my matrix server with ever IM bridged through to it. It's pretty amazing to be honest.

vips7L 6y ago

I just wish the desktop app could send regular sms via my phone.

pmlnr 6y ago

signald[^1] + signal libpurple plugin[^2] (finch, pidgin, adium, bitlbee, etc) works beautifully. [^1]: https://gitlab.com/signald/signald https://gitlab.com/signald/signald [^2]: https://github.com/hoehermann/libpurple-signald https://github.com/hoehermann/libpurple-signald

johnchristopher 6y ago
Each time I tried something like that I had to authenticate every devices again. But maybe I am doing something wrong.

pr956738850 6y ago

~/apps isn't the answer. There is already a well-established convention for ~/bin. Applications should not be installed in user profile space. Many supported *nixes deprecate your touching system directories /bin, /usr etc and there's a well-established convention for placing added software in /opt, a filer share, removable media etc. An advantage of AppImage is that they don't change the system package database and can be run from /opt a share or removable media. Yes, there needs to be a mechanism for update of third-party applications. ~/apps isn't it. Imagine in a corporation that uses Linux desktops, 1,000 users clicking to update a third-party bloated electron app to ~/apps.