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I've been using this as the data source for a Matrix bridge for the better part of a year now. I'm thrilled with it so far! The only worry I have is Signals hos

I've been using this as the data source for a Matrix bridge for the better part of a year now. I'm thrilled with it so far! The only worry I have is Signals hostility towards analogous projects, but for the meantime it works for me as this is helping me wean off Signal. Maybe one day regular people will use Matrix...

gaius_baltar 5y ago
> The only worry I have is Signals hostility towards analogous projects Moxie certainly know that, but he can't actually prevent third-party clients. Not even Microsoft, ICQ and AOL succeeded on this when we were using Pidgin (and Licq and Gaim before that) to talk in MSN Messenger, ICQ and AIM.
- sarakayakomzin 5y ago
  big difference between using the name Signal and writing a third party client.
- abstract_put 5y ago
  Yeah, it creates an adversarial relationship which isn't particularly pleasant. E.g. they have no incentive to build functionality to help integrate, nor do they have the same incentive to provide stable integration points. In fact, it sounds like stable integration points are borderline actively dissuaded as they would limit agility of Signal and relegate it to irrelevance. As much as I disagree with the underlying values, I haven't carved out 40 million monthly active users from a crowded space, so maybe it really is the best chance.
- Macha 5y ago
  And yet whatsapp, discord and slack are all doing pretty well at it.
  - arsome 5y ago
    I can't speak to the others but judging by the amount of spam I get on Discord, they certainly aren't.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    I kinda feel like that's more due to lack of interest than anything else, at least on the part of WhatsApp, which is restricted enough feature-wise that it'd be somewhat feasible to reverse engineer and build a client. If I think about something like Slack or Discord, though, they surface area of those things are just huge. So many protocol details to work out, and so many features to duplicate for a third-party client. And they're such moving targets, too, with features added at a regular cadence (unlike AIM, ICQ, etc. back then, though even then Gaim/Pidgin didn't have voice & video support for a long time). I also think the third-party client drive for AIM and ICQ was driven by people who wanted to use it on Linux but had no way to do so at all. The clients were Windows- (and Mac-?) only, WINE was a pain to use back then, and there were no web clients initially. But with Slack and Discord the impetus just isn't there. At least with Slack (I'm not super familiar with Discord), Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and iOS are all officially supported, and there's always the web client if you don't like the Electron-based desktop clients. On top of that, Slack's API is rich enough to enable things like a Matrix bridge, so, again, probably just not enough interest to do something truly standalone. The only thing I'm somewhat surprised about is that no one has tried to build a third-party standalone WhatsApp client that doesn't require being tethered to the mobile client. But perhaps Facebook/WhatsApp has done a better job at obfuscating and hiding their protocol than AOL and Mirabilis did long ago. Or maybe the interest just isn't strong enough to warrant the effort.
    - Bellamy 5y ago
      I would love to have a anonymous WhatsApp client. Even if the features set would include only reading and writing.
      - squarefoot 5y ago
        Same here. I'm literally forced to use it with no more than a dozen contacts among close friends and part of the family, and despite the very short list of people, it's absolutely impossible to convince anyone of them to use anything else. I would so welcome a FOSS client.
    - lxgr 5y ago
  - finnn 5y ago
    there are matrix bridges for all three of those https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-whatsapp https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-whatsapp https://github.com/Half-Shot/matrix-appservice-discord https://github.com/Half-Shot/matrix-appservice-discord https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice-slack https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice-slack
    - patrakov 5y ago
      The whatsapp bridge is based on the whatsapp-web api, which is non-functional if your phone is off. The phone part is what needs reverse engineering and replacing.
    - rsa25519 5y ago
      The Discord and Slack bridges use the respective platforms' official APIs, fwiw
  - tut-urut-utut 5y ago
    The official WhatsApp client has an excellent UX. There's simply no reason to use another. For Signal it's not the case. The client is slow, has many quirks and lack features. If Moxie allowed third-party clients, it would be a win-win situation. Over time users will get a usable client, and the core Signal team would be able to concentrate on their Crypto business.
    - jeltz 5y ago
      Is everyone using another WhatsApp client than me? If I would rate all chat clients I have used I would put it in the bottom 2, only Skype has a worse client.
    - simias 5y ago
      I completely agree that Signal could very much use a third-party client, especially on the desktop. That being said if they want to push their cryptocrap they have to keep a strong control on the clients because third parties are likely to just ignore that functionality altogether, hampering adoption. I'm not saying that's the main reason for them to exert such a tight control on the Signal ecosystem but it shows how damaging that move has been: now you can't really exclude an ulterior motive for them refusing to integrate with third parties. It damaged the trust I had in the project.
      - vips7L 5y ago
        The signal desktop app is severely neglected. The UX is terrible and users have been begging for it to be able to interact with regular SMS for years.
  - smolder 5y ago
    Ripcord exists, which is a slack AND discord client made by a third party.
- tptacek 5y ago
  Nobody needs to absolutely prevent third-party clients; they just need to create enough friction to prevent serious investment in those clients. At least in Signal's case, there's a clear rationale for why they're doing that.
CameronNemo 5y ago
Do you have a link to the matrix bridge? Do you use signald or signal-go.
- abstract_put 5y ago
  Mentioned elsewhere, the list of bridges is pretty complete: https://matrix.org/bridges/ https://matrix.org/bridges/, specifically I used https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal (and the same author's WhatsApp and SMS bridges).
noman-land 5y ago
Mind sharing the matrix bridge? I think we are really close to regular people using matrix. Element is a really good client but it's slightly too rough around the edges still. We need something that's as joyful and fun to use (and look at) as Slack. We also need a very easy export/import process for other clients. That's a huuuge untapped feature. It means the data stays the same but you just slap a new UI on top of it. "Apps" then only compete on UI which means the diversity and sophistication of those experiences will grow rapidly. Combine that with a plug and play self hosting solution eventually and we're well on the road to secure personal clouds.
- gary-kim 5y ago
  This is likely the one they are referring to: https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal/ https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal/ I use it myself and it has been working perfectly for me since I switched to it.
- abstract_put 5y ago
  I found it on Matrix's site[0], direct link is here[1]. It's a bit of a pain to set up initially, particularly in a Docker-Compose deployment, as the containers are created to incrementally build up configuration. > I think we are really close to regular people using matrix. I personally haven't met any "real" people who are even aware of Matrix. When I broached it with a non-IT friend, they were actively uninterested in unifying messaging applications as they had "facebook friends" and "whatsapp friends" and interacted with them differently. > export/import process for other clients conversation history, you mean? Is there other data a messaging app captures that you want access to? [0]: https://matrix.org/bridges/ https://matrix.org/bridges/ [1]: https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    That doesn't use signald. It uses the full desktop client in nodejs and as such uses a lot of memory :(
    - 5y ago
bogota 5y ago
I want to like matrix but the UI is just beyond terrible when you enable encryption. It also just ends up in lots of strange situations where if you log in from a new place the verification system completely bugs out. I can barely make sense of what it wants most of the time let alone getting non tech friends to use it. I want to like matrix but the non default encryption and terrible UI on element is a dealbreaker.
- SahAssar 5y ago
  Are you talking about just element or did you try more of the clients?
- Reventlov 5y ago
  Yeah I completely agree. And server side, it's not good either (you can't federate with only a few servers, bugs are everywhere)… I honestly don't get how it started to be the "de facto" open source chat system trying to replace IRC while it is this broken.
  - inciampati 5y ago
    Those are minor growing pains, and irrelevant when compared to the nightmare of navigating fifty independent slack instances or convincing an entire group to move their communication onto a private solution. For me matrix has been absolutely transformative. It's letting us grow our project's realtime communication without bounds. Because it's open and federated, without the political baggage of tools like Signal or the ancient cruft of IRC, we can convince anyone to meet us there. There are almost no impediments to it's use. The clunkiness is very minor. Although they may lack some subtle UI polish, the tools don't crash and work more than well enough. I'm looking forward to when the world meets on matrix.
    - lxgr 5y ago
      > Those are minor growing pains In my experience, neglecting the onboarding experience is a cardinal sin for any project challenging some incumbent. I‘ve been struggling with understanding what Element wants from me when signing up or signing in on a new device. Unfortunately I can‘t, in good conscience, recommend this to less technically knowledgeable friends and family.
idclip 5y ago
Didnt expect moxie to be hostile to similar projects ...
- Vinnl 5y ago
  The motivation presumably is that if people start using Signal, but half their messages don't arrive because their contact is using a half-baked third-party client that hasn't kept up with Signal's development, then that's a great way to lose potential users.
  - idclip 5y ago
    Messages dont exactly arrive on time with the iphone client. There seem to be propagation and rekeying delays. Its very frustrating
  - eptcyka 5y ago
    I'm using telegram-foss and it definitely works better than Signal's first party Android client.
    - idclip 5y ago
      Telegram here too. Signal has event propagation and rekeying issue
  - simias 5y ago
    Instead I lose half my messages because the desktop application won't sync correctly and/or corrupt its database every other week. Surely there's a version header in the protocol that could be used to reject outdated clients outright? That wouldn't be much of an issue if the official clients worked better and had the features I expect from a modern IM client. For instance I never really considered using a third party Telegram client because the official one works really well in my experience. But apparently proper syncing will have to wait while they implement a cryptocurrency payment system. Priorities.
    - 5y ago

gaius_baltar 5y ago

> The only worry I have is Signals hostility towards analogous projects Moxie certainly know that, but he can't actually prevent third-party clients. Not even Microsoft, ICQ and AOL succeeded on this when we were using Pidgin (and Licq and Gaim before that) to talk in MSN Messenger, ICQ and AIM.

sarakayakomzin 5y ago
big difference between using the name Signal and writing a third party client.
abstract_put 5y ago
Yeah, it creates an adversarial relationship which isn't particularly pleasant. E.g. they have no incentive to build functionality to help integrate, nor do they have the same incentive to provide stable integration points. In fact, it sounds like stable integration points are borderline actively dissuaded as they would limit agility of Signal and relegate it to irrelevance. As much as I disagree with the underlying values, I haven't carved out 40 million monthly active users from a crowded space, so maybe it really is the best chance.
Macha 5y ago
And yet whatsapp, discord and slack are all doing pretty well at it.
- arsome 5y ago
  I can't speak to the others but judging by the amount of spam I get on Discord, they certainly aren't.
- kelnos 5y ago
  I kinda feel like that's more due to lack of interest than anything else, at least on the part of WhatsApp, which is restricted enough feature-wise that it'd be somewhat feasible to reverse engineer and build a client. If I think about something like Slack or Discord, though, they surface area of those things are just huge. So many protocol details to work out, and so many features to duplicate for a third-party client. And they're such moving targets, too, with features added at a regular cadence (unlike AIM, ICQ, etc. back then, though even then Gaim/Pidgin didn't have voice & video support for a long time). I also think the third-party client drive for AIM and ICQ was driven by people who wanted to use it on Linux but had no way to do so at all. The clients were Windows- (and Mac-?) only, WINE was a pain to use back then, and there were no web clients initially. But with Slack and Discord the impetus just isn't there. At least with Slack (I'm not super familiar with Discord), Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, and iOS are all officially supported, and there's always the web client if you don't like the Electron-based desktop clients. On top of that, Slack's API is rich enough to enable things like a Matrix bridge, so, again, probably just not enough interest to do something truly standalone. The only thing I'm somewhat surprised about is that no one has tried to build a third-party standalone WhatsApp client that doesn't require being tethered to the mobile client. But perhaps Facebook/WhatsApp has done a better job at obfuscating and hiding their protocol than AOL and Mirabilis did long ago. Or maybe the interest just isn't strong enough to warrant the effort.
  - Bellamy 5y ago
    I would love to have a anonymous WhatsApp client. Even if the features set would include only reading and writing.
    - squarefoot 5y ago
      Same here. I'm literally forced to use it with no more than a dozen contacts among close friends and part of the family, and despite the very short list of people, it's absolutely impossible to convince anyone of them to use anything else. I would so welcome a FOSS client.
  - lxgr 5y ago
- finnn 5y ago
  there are matrix bridges for all three of those https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-whatsapp https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-whatsapp https://github.com/Half-Shot/matrix-appservice-discord https://github.com/Half-Shot/matrix-appservice-discord https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice-slack https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-appservice-slack
  - patrakov 5y ago
    The whatsapp bridge is based on the whatsapp-web api, which is non-functional if your phone is off. The phone part is what needs reverse engineering and replacing.
  - rsa25519 5y ago
    The Discord and Slack bridges use the respective platforms' official APIs, fwiw
- tut-urut-utut 5y ago
  The official WhatsApp client has an excellent UX. There's simply no reason to use another. For Signal it's not the case. The client is slow, has many quirks and lack features. If Moxie allowed third-party clients, it would be a win-win situation. Over time users will get a usable client, and the core Signal team would be able to concentrate on their Crypto business.
  - jeltz 5y ago
    Is everyone using another WhatsApp client than me? If I would rate all chat clients I have used I would put it in the bottom 2, only Skype has a worse client.
  - simias 5y ago
    I completely agree that Signal could very much use a third-party client, especially on the desktop. That being said if they want to push their cryptocrap they have to keep a strong control on the clients because third parties are likely to just ignore that functionality altogether, hampering adoption. I'm not saying that's the main reason for them to exert such a tight control on the Signal ecosystem but it shows how damaging that move has been: now you can't really exclude an ulterior motive for them refusing to integrate with third parties. It damaged the trust I had in the project.
    - vips7L 5y ago
      The signal desktop app is severely neglected. The UX is terrible and users have been begging for it to be able to interact with regular SMS for years.
- smolder 5y ago
  Ripcord exists, which is a slack AND discord client made by a third party.
tptacek 5y ago
Nobody needs to absolutely prevent third-party clients; they just need to create enough friction to prevent serious investment in those clients. At least in Signal's case, there's a clear rationale for why they're doing that.

CameronNemo 5y ago

Do you have a link to the matrix bridge? Do you use signald or signal-go.

abstract_put 5y ago
Mentioned elsewhere, the list of bridges is pretty complete: https://matrix.org/bridges/ https://matrix.org/bridges/, specifically I used https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal (and the same author's WhatsApp and SMS bridges).

noman-land 5y ago

Mind sharing the matrix bridge? I think we are really close to regular people using matrix. Element is a really good client but it's slightly too rough around the edges still. We need something that's as joyful and fun to use (and look at) as Slack. We also need a very easy export/import process for other clients. That's a huuuge untapped feature. It means the data stays the same but you just slap a new UI on top of it. "Apps" then only compete on UI which means the diversity and sophistication of those experiences will grow rapidly. Combine that with a plug and play self hosting solution eventually and we're well on the road to secure personal clouds.

gary-kim 5y ago
This is likely the one they are referring to: https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal/ https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal/ I use it myself and it has been working perfectly for me since I switched to it.
abstract_put 5y ago
I found it on Matrix's site[0], direct link is here[1]. It's a bit of a pain to set up initially, particularly in a Docker-Compose deployment, as the containers are created to incrementally build up configuration. > I think we are really close to regular people using matrix. I personally haven't met any "real" people who are even aware of Matrix. When I broached it with a non-IT friend, they were actively uninterested in unifying messaging applications as they had "facebook friends" and "whatsapp friends" and interacted with them differently. > export/import process for other clients conversation history, you mean? Is there other data a messaging app captures that you want access to? [0]: https://matrix.org/bridges/ https://matrix.org/bridges/ [1]: https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal https://github.com/tulir/mautrix-signal
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  That doesn't use signald. It uses the full desktop client in nodejs and as such uses a lot of memory :(
  - 5y ago

bogota 5y ago

I want to like matrix but the UI is just beyond terrible when you enable encryption. It also just ends up in lots of strange situations where if you log in from a new place the verification system completely bugs out. I can barely make sense of what it wants most of the time let alone getting non tech friends to use it. I want to like matrix but the non default encryption and terrible UI on element is a dealbreaker.

SahAssar 5y ago
Are you talking about just element or did you try more of the clients?
Reventlov 5y ago
Yeah I completely agree. And server side, it's not good either (you can't federate with only a few servers, bugs are everywhere)… I honestly don't get how it started to be the "de facto" open source chat system trying to replace IRC while it is this broken.
- inciampati 5y ago
  Those are minor growing pains, and irrelevant when compared to the nightmare of navigating fifty independent slack instances or convincing an entire group to move their communication onto a private solution. For me matrix has been absolutely transformative. It's letting us grow our project's realtime communication without bounds. Because it's open and federated, without the political baggage of tools like Signal or the ancient cruft of IRC, we can convince anyone to meet us there. There are almost no impediments to it's use. The clunkiness is very minor. Although they may lack some subtle UI polish, the tools don't crash and work more than well enough. I'm looking forward to when the world meets on matrix.
  - lxgr 5y ago
    > Those are minor growing pains In my experience, neglecting the onboarding experience is a cardinal sin for any project challenging some incumbent. I‘ve been struggling with understanding what Element wants from me when signing up or signing in on a new device. Unfortunately I can‘t, in good conscience, recommend this to less technically knowledgeable friends and family.

idclip 5y ago

Didnt expect moxie to be hostile to similar projects ...

Vinnl 5y ago
The motivation presumably is that if people start using Signal, but half their messages don't arrive because their contact is using a half-baked third-party client that hasn't kept up with Signal's development, then that's a great way to lose potential users.
- idclip 5y ago
  Messages dont exactly arrive on time with the iphone client. There seem to be propagation and rekeying delays. Its very frustrating
- eptcyka 5y ago
  I'm using telegram-foss and it definitely works better than Signal's first party Android client.
  - idclip 5y ago
    Telegram here too. Signal has event propagation and rekeying issue
- simias 5y ago
  Instead I lose half my messages because the desktop application won't sync correctly and/or corrupt its database every other week. Surely there's a version header in the protocol that could be used to reject outdated clients outright? That wouldn't be much of an issue if the official clients worked better and had the features I expect from a modern IM client. For instance I never really considered using a third party Telegram client because the official one works really well in my experience. But apparently proper syncing will have to wait while they implement a cryptocurrency payment system. Priorities.
  - 5y ago