6 ms·

Texts – One inbox. All your messages

16 points by bevacqua 6y ago

muhammadusman 6y ago
There's so many of these but all are in "early access" phase...seems like they haven't figured out how to do iMessages integration and it's just a nicely designed UI with no real product.
- lxgr 6y ago
  +1, the real challenge here isn't UI design, it's integrating with several messaging services that are actively preventing being integrated in such a way.
  - johnmorrison 6y ago
    Exactly
- KishanBagaria 6y ago
  Texts is a live product (landing page has a real screenshot) and it does support iMessage on Mac by connecting to the official process. We've done the most extensive research on it afaik.
  - tyre 6y ago
    How are you integrating? What is the "official process" mentioned? As far as I know, there are no Apple APIs built for these integrations. Are you just connecting to the local SQLite database?
    - KishanBagaria 6y ago
      Official Messages app/process. And we do connect to the SQLite for reading stuff.
      - tyre 6y ago
        Oh as in interacting with the app? I looked a while back to see if it was AppleScript-able but seemed to be no longer supported. Are you using something else? Or are there actually APIs in MacOS to hit?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
stonogo 6y ago
All these messaging startups are really dug in on the idea that nobody uses SMS. I guess that's fine depending on which bubble you live in, but the company who cracks that case stands to gain a lot. And yes, I know there are parts of the world who never use SMS. There are other large parts who do and they have money too.
- lxgr 6y ago
  FWIW, this looks like it's macOS only so far, and by integrating with iMessage it would support SMS as well (at least for iPhone users that have forwarding to iMessage enabled).
- 29083011397778 6y ago
  There's an SMS bridge for Matrix right now, and has been for awhile. Caveats are that I have only seen the Android client when browsing F-Droid, and I haven't tried it myself yet. All the other bridges I do use (Whatsapp, Telegram), however, have been top notch
thebiglebrewski 6y ago
Wow how much was that domain name?!
peter-m80 6y ago
Pidgin fork?
lucasmullens 6y ago
"Sign Up" goes straight to logging in with Google, which is pretty jarring since it doesn't even mention Google on the button.
visviva 6y ago
Signal is conspicuously absent from the list of supported platforms...
- MAGZine 6y ago
  There's no open API which is a problem when things are E2E encrypted.
  - lxgr 6y ago
    Neither is there for iMessage or WhatsApp. Most WhatsApp clients rely on scraping the websocket channel used by the official web client, but that requires your phone to be online to send and receive new messages. I'm assuming iMessage scraping happens on macOS, requiring your mac to be online as well.
- KishanBagaria 6y ago
  Signal integration is in alpha, not launched to users yet.
babelfish 6y ago
Looks like Matrix is really taking off - this is the third "unified messaging interface" app on HN this week.
- KishanBagaria 6y ago
  Texts runs completely locally and isn't based on Matrix. It uses a custom protocol designed in house more suited for bridging. All platform integrations have been developed from the ground up as well.
  - kitkat_new 6y ago
    How do you know? How could it be more suited to bridging than Matrix which had bridging in mind since it's existence?
  - babelfish 6y ago
    Good to know, and very cool that it works for iMessage, but using a proprietary protocol for bridging when all of the competitors are using a standardized one that is likely to grow in functionality much faster than yours may not be the best choice.
johnmorrison 6y ago
Earlier alternate -> https://valyr.io/ https://valyr.io/ Planned support for also Email (first priority), SMS, Signal, matrix, etc
- kitkat_new 6y ago
  details? Advantages over Beeper and this one? Where are they all coming from suddenly? curious
  - johnmorrison 6y ago
    This one has been in dev since over a year ago I think but yeah I have no idea where all the new ones are coming from!
montecarl 6y ago
What I find frustrating is that I cannot read or write SMS or iMessages on my computer (I don't use OSX). I'm not going to be that person who asks all their contacts to message them using some new app. Can this service really interface with iMessage somehow? I thought it was locked down by Apple.
- lxgr 6y ago
  I'm guessing it'll somehow have to scrape the macOS client, with obvious implications. There is no way they'll manage to integrate with the servers directly.
  - sjtgraham 6y ago
    > There is no way they'll manage to integrate with the servers directly. Of course they will be able to do that. It's 100% possible.
    - lxgr 6y ago
      How, if the client authentication key is implemented in Apple's hardware? At least the device serial number is already used as part of iMessage authentication (it needs to be spoofed to work on Hackintoshes as far as I've read), and Apple has secure hardware that can easily support actual attestation in all of their recent devices.
      - sjtgraham 6y ago
        > How, if the client authentication key is implemented in Apple's hardware? It isn’t.
        lxgr 6y ago
        Ok, maybe I should have been more precise: Authentication already involves an Apple-specific hardware property (i.e. the serial number), demonstrating Apple's dislike for third-party clients. It would be trivial for them to introduce a more effective means of client attestation (e.g. FairPlay DRM, which is alreadypart of every iOS and macOS device). I certainly hope I'm wrong about this (I'd love to see a third-party client for iMessage), but I'm pessimistic.
psim1 6y ago
Sign up for your service based on a screenshot and a few blurbs?
sgeisler 6y ago
Which platforms are actually supported? I didn't find that on the landing page. Seems like an interesting product if it works on linux and with Signal etc. BUT: Stating "Privacy first." as a goal and then requiring to sign up with google is … inconsistent at least (I get that it's easier though).
- geoah 6y ago
  There is a link underneath that allows you to fill in a form with your email
  - sgeisler 6y ago
    Thx, I must have missed it (it admittedly is very small ^^)!
kitkat_new 6y ago
Advantage over Beeper? HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25848278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25848278
XCSme 6y ago
My biggest concern is the notifications. I already have problems with multi-device notifications while using directly the messaging platforms (Telegram, FB Messenger, etc.), I think that adding an extra layer on top would make the notifications even less stable (getting same notification on multiple devices even after reading the message, not getting notifications on some devices, not receiving messages, etc.)

16 points by bevacqua 6y ago

There's so many of these but all are in "early access" phase...seems like they haven't figured out how to do iMessages integration and it's just a nicely designed UI with no real product.

lxgr 6y ago
+1, the real challenge here isn't UI design, it's integrating with several messaging services that are actively preventing being integrated in such a way.
- johnmorrison 6y ago
  Exactly
KishanBagaria 6y ago
Texts is a live product (landing page has a real screenshot) and it does support iMessage on Mac by connecting to the official process. We've done the most extensive research on it afaik.
- tyre 6y ago
  How are you integrating? What is the "official process" mentioned? As far as I know, there are no Apple APIs built for these integrations. Are you just connecting to the local SQLite database?
  - KishanBagaria 6y ago
    Official Messages app/process. And we do connect to the SQLite for reading stuff.
    - tyre 6y ago
      Oh as in interacting with the app? I looked a while back to see if it was AppleScript-able but seemed to be no longer supported. Are you using something else? Or are there actually APIs in MacOS to hit?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

stonogo 6y ago

All these messaging startups are really dug in on the idea that nobody uses SMS. I guess that's fine depending on which bubble you live in, but the company who cracks that case stands to gain a lot. And yes, I know there are parts of the world who never use SMS. There are other large parts who do and they have money too.

lxgr 6y ago
FWIW, this looks like it's macOS only so far, and by integrating with iMessage it would support SMS as well (at least for iPhone users that have forwarding to iMessage enabled).
29083011397778 6y ago
There's an SMS bridge for Matrix right now, and has been for awhile. Caveats are that I have only seen the Android client when browsing F-Droid, and I haven't tried it myself yet. All the other bridges I do use (Whatsapp, Telegram), however, have been top notch

thebiglebrewski 6y ago

Wow how much was that domain name?!

peter-m80 6y ago

Pidgin fork?

lucasmullens 6y ago

"Sign Up" goes straight to logging in with Google, which is pretty jarring since it doesn't even mention Google on the button.

visviva 6y ago

Signal is conspicuously absent from the list of supported platforms...

MAGZine 6y ago
There's no open API which is a problem when things are E2E encrypted.
- lxgr 6y ago
  Neither is there for iMessage or WhatsApp. Most WhatsApp clients rely on scraping the websocket channel used by the official web client, but that requires your phone to be online to send and receive new messages. I'm assuming iMessage scraping happens on macOS, requiring your mac to be online as well.
KishanBagaria 6y ago
Signal integration is in alpha, not launched to users yet.

babelfish 6y ago

Looks like Matrix is really taking off - this is the third "unified messaging interface" app on HN this week.

KishanBagaria 6y ago
Texts runs completely locally and isn't based on Matrix. It uses a custom protocol designed in house more suited for bridging. All platform integrations have been developed from the ground up as well.
- kitkat_new 6y ago
  How do you know? How could it be more suited to bridging than Matrix which had bridging in mind since it's existence?
- babelfish 6y ago
  Good to know, and very cool that it works for iMessage, but using a proprietary protocol for bridging when all of the competitors are using a standardized one that is likely to grow in functionality much faster than yours may not be the best choice.

johnmorrison 6y ago

Earlier alternate -> https://valyr.io/ https://valyr.io/ Planned support for also Email (first priority), SMS, Signal, matrix, etc

kitkat_new 6y ago
details? Advantages over Beeper and this one? Where are they all coming from suddenly? curious
- johnmorrison 6y ago
  This one has been in dev since over a year ago I think but yeah I have no idea where all the new ones are coming from!

montecarl 6y ago

What I find frustrating is that I cannot read or write SMS or iMessages on my computer (I don't use OSX). I'm not going to be that person who asks all their contacts to message them using some new app. Can this service really interface with iMessage somehow? I thought it was locked down by Apple.

lxgr 6y ago
I'm guessing it'll somehow have to scrape the macOS client, with obvious implications. There is no way they'll manage to integrate with the servers directly.
- sjtgraham 6y ago
  > There is no way they'll manage to integrate with the servers directly. Of course they will be able to do that. It's 100% possible.
  - lxgr 6y ago
    How, if the client authentication key is implemented in Apple's hardware? At least the device serial number is already used as part of iMessage authentication (it needs to be spoofed to work on Hackintoshes as far as I've read), and Apple has secure hardware that can easily support actual attestation in all of their recent devices.
    - sjtgraham 6y ago
      > How, if the client authentication key is implemented in Apple's hardware? It isn’t.
      - lxgr 6y ago
        Ok, maybe I should have been more precise: Authentication already involves an Apple-specific hardware property (i.e. the serial number), demonstrating Apple's dislike for third-party clients. It would be trivial for them to introduce a more effective means of client attestation (e.g. FairPlay DRM, which is alreadypart of every iOS and macOS device). I certainly hope I'm wrong about this (I'd love to see a third-party client for iMessage), but I'm pessimistic.

psim1 6y ago

sgeisler 6y ago

Which platforms are actually supported? I didn't find that on the landing page. Seems like an interesting product if it works on linux and with Signal etc. BUT: Stating "Privacy first." as a goal and then requiring to sign up with google is … inconsistent at least (I get that it's easier though).

geoah 6y ago
There is a link underneath that allows you to fill in a form with your email
- sgeisler 6y ago
  Thx, I must have missed it (it admittedly is very small ^^)!

kitkat_new 6y ago

Advantage over Beeper? HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25848278 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25848278

XCSme 6y ago

My biggest concern is the notifications. I already have problems with multi-device notifications while using directly the messaging platforms (Telegram, FB Messenger, etc.), I think that adding an extra layer on top would make the notifications even less stable (getting same notification on multiple devices even after reading the message, not getting notifications on some devices, not receiving messages, etc.)