27 ms·

Revolt: Open-source alternative to Discord

642 points by adamnemecek 5y ago

adamnemecek 5y ago
Github link: https://github.com/revoltchat https://github.com/revoltchat The backend is in Rust, frontend is Typescript.
- mirekrusin 5y ago
  Repository management and self hosted scripts in Shell. Documentation in HTML and JavaScript. Powered by git. And github. Built in editing in vscode support. Icons in PNG. Badges in SVG!
mathw 5y ago
Not sure "written in Rust" is a headline thing that's worth mentioning anymore. Particularly amusing in this case when parts of Discord are written in Rust too.
- drcongo 5y ago
  On anything you can self-run it's a very useful qualifier. Personally I ignore anything that says "written in Node" because I don't want those headaches.
  - Aeolun 5y ago
    That’s a shame. Node is quite easy to run. Biggest problem is that installing any app includes a free black hole.
    - vaughan 5y ago
      JS and Rust are best friends. Deno is written in Rust. And many Node native libs are being written in Rust.
      - Popegaf 5y ago
        It's not JS or node that's the problem, it's the JS ecosystem. Badly or too broadly defined dependencies can (and do) lead to pulling a new version of a dep that introduced a breaking API change and tada, you have to start hunting for the right version. Most projects don't define the node version that their project runs on either, so what ran in node 8 might not run in node 14 now. What's wonderful to run into is non-JS dependencies: node-gyp happens to be used here and there. Sometimes the native lib will be pulled, sometimes it will be built, who knows why. And node-gyp might then depend on python2 which might not even be present on newer distros anymore. And so on and so forth. If it doesn't come in an AppImage or docker image, there's no chance I'm getting myself into a node mess.
        vaughan 5y ago
        Yep, I know the pain all too well. ESM is also currently a disaster as many popular packages migrate without transpiling to CJS and you cannot call ESM from CJS contexts. As you said, it's good to separate the ecosystem from the language/runtime. Things will improve over time, but everything has just been in transition for so long. I dream of the day that transpilers are no longer needed and TypeScript is baked in to all browsers. Until then it is a mess. > node-gyp might then depend on python2 `cmake-js` is the preferred option now. And Rust native deps don't have this issue.
    - tluyben2 5y ago
      ... if the application was written recently. Get something from last year on your 'now' computer and let the suffering begin. Without a docker setup, I really find node horrible vs let's say .NET Core, Java/Closure or Go. But ymmv. A project I inherited has node_modules of 780MB with 150k files with many deprecated and vulnerable ones in them pinned versions: I would not call that easy. I never had that with .net: usually you need a few nugets and if you update them, they still work. That I would call easy. I have used both (and java for over 20 years) for 10+ years, I just do not like the ecosystem (or language but that is ok with typescript and purescript and cljs): I have to anyway.
    - vagrantJin 5y ago
      > includes a free black hole. This is gospel at this point. Npmming and yarning are giving me anxiety these days.
  - zbrozek 5y ago
    Ditto. It's a good indicator of being a sloppily-written pile of dependencies I don't want to touch. I also discriminate against Electron software, at least as much as I'm able.
  - OJFord 5y ago
    It's interesting, I suspect we all have our thing we avoid like that - for me it's Java stuff. I don't say that to 'defend' node, I'm no JS fan boy or particularly experienced with it, it just doesn't bother me the way Java stuff does - the dread I have for a Java stack trace appearing from something I'm trying to run is enough to make me see if there's an equivalent that ticks the same boxes in another language!
    - brabel 5y ago
      These days Java applications are supposed to embed the JVM using jlink images or even native installer (see jpackage). So you shouldn't even know if the app is written in Java when you run it.
      - nick__m 5y ago
        As someone who now does more operation than devloppement, I want my server side Java app to run on a full JVM, attaching jconsle or jstack to a running process is so usefull. No other runtime on Linux gives the observability you get by default when you run on a full JVM. On Windows that another story since you have ETW which is incredible and works with anything. But on Linux, if your application doesn't offer observability, you have to resort to strace and adhoc EBPF that you have to write, to diagnose a missbehaving application in production.
      - vips7L 5y ago
        The problem with jpackage/jlink is that most teams are stuck on an antiquated runtime and those tools didn’t ship until Java 14 (correct me if I’m wrong about the version). My own company is still making new projects on Java 8.
        brabel 5y ago
        At work, we use some pretty complex stuff in our builds, including linking to C libs, Groovy testing, Kotlin modules, as well as the majority of the code in Java. It took quite a lot of effort, but we managed to move to Java 11 this year. It's great to be able to use new Java language/platform features. We're moving to Java 17 next year once the dust settles (it will be the first LTS release in 3 years and comes up this month - Sep 2021)... it will be a much easier migration as there's nothing like the big Java 9 barrier to cross. I can't understand why anyone would start something new in Java 8, all traditional Java tooling already works really well with Java 11 and even Java 17.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
  For me I think “written in Rust”actually does add a lot. It is a signal that this will be easy to build, easy to deploy (because it is compiled into a single binary in general), memory safe, and likely to be written by a someone that cares about performance and efficiency. I think those are all valuable hints.
  - spopejoy 5y ago
    > memory safe That's an incorrect assumption if you haven't audited the code. > likely to be written by a someone that cares about performance and efficiency Ah, the stamp of approval that comes from signalling to the "right people". Reminds me of the preamble to almost every C++ Boost library -- "written with performance in mind".
    - adamnemecek 5y ago
      > That's an incorrect assumption if you haven't audited the code. Even without an audit, the odds of a Rust project being memory safe are so much higher than in comparable languages. Furthermore, Rust makes auditing so much easier by allowing you to concentrate on unsafe blocks.
      - cjbprime 5y ago
        That's a confusing statement -- JS/Node and Golang are comparable (memory safe) languages for API server backends.
        zozbot234 5y ago
        Golang is only memory safe if you're not using the concurrency features. It doesn't protect against data races which can break safety.
        spopejoy 5y ago
        Rust hasn't magically solved concurrency safety either, as linearity is not enough. GC'd languages (Java, Go, Haskell etc) are safer than Rust by default, you just have the tradeoff of GC. Note that this isn't always a tradeoff as GCs can outperform static allocation in scenarios like large dynamic heaps. Haskell is the safest for concurrency because of the strictly typed functional semantics.
- onionisafruit 5y ago
  Similarly I used to have an issue with the number of projects submitted to /r/golang that are “a whatever server written in go”. If I wanted to see a new whatever server I would be looking elsewhere and wouldn’t particularly care what language it’s implemented with. Nowadays I’ve come around to appreciating the opportunity to see what other gophers are doing. I usually skip over those posts but occasionally I look at the code and learn something new. Even when I’m dealing with compiles binaries, I slightly prefer something written in a language I’m familiar with just so there’s a better chance I will be able to diagnose any bugs I encounter.
- bachmeier 5y ago
  Totally agree. It's not good for HN to have this kind of repetitive language promotion on the front page. I could see if this was the first major project written in the language, which would make it noteworthy, but something like this needs to stand on its own without the upvotes of Rust fans.
  - busterarm 5y ago
    It bothers me that we don't view it as a problem on this board the fact that we have an entire upvote/downvote brigade that reacts purely on whether you're speaking good or ill about Rust. I'm not one to tell moderators what to do but on some boards people get told off severely for such behavior. "x in rust"[1] threads are so prevalent that they should get a ranking penalty. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=%22in%20rust%22&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
    - sodality2 5y ago
      Disagree- three of the first six most recent submissions containing "in rust" are simply educational/about the rust language in general and not showing off a project (while using "rust" as a selling point). https://i.imgur.com/WCD7iem.png https://i.imgur.com/WCD7iem.png
      - jhgb 5y ago
        Why not the fifth entry? That seems similar to the highlighted ones.
        sodality2 5y ago
        Yep, that one is informative as well. My bad!
  - mbreese 5y ago
    This is the way it’s always been though. First it was Java, then Ruby, then Clojure, then Go, then Node, and now Rust. As languages get popular, multiple projects get rewritten in them. At first it’s a novelty, but it is often useful to see what the strengths and weaknesses are of a language to implement an existing project. Eventually, it becomes annoying to have “written in X” attached to articles and links, but soon, that will diminish. The only time when I think it’s really appropriate for a mature language is when the language itself is a feature. But that is really rare for that to be the case. Other languages (eg Python, Haskell and Erlang) are in the mix too, but more evenly distributed and less fad-ish. This is just part of the hype cycle of languages. I’m not saying Rust is only a fad, but we are definitely in that part of the cycle for Rust.
- nabakin 5y ago
  Yeah that makes sense. Revolt was posted to r/Rust yesterday so OP is probably a person who frequents r/Rust and thought it was notable.
- marsven_422 5y ago
  It's good it say rust since I fail the "correct political opinion" test for using rust I will be unable to install it.
- axegon_ 5y ago
  Exactly what I said yesterday in a different thread: > One thing that makes me appreciate it even more is the fact that it's written in rust without the authors trying to make it into a primary selling point, which is annoyingly common in these days("X written in rust").
- jedisct1 5y ago
  This is getting very lousy.
- hestefisk 5y ago
  But apart from the advertisement of language choice, an OSS alternative is quite good, no? I’d be keen to try it out.
- timdorr 5y ago
  Also, only the backend is written in Rust. The desktop client is an Electron app: https://github.com/revoltchat/desktop https://github.com/revoltchat/desktop
  - jstx1 5y ago
    Now I want to know if HN hates Electron more than it loves Rust. Or do they perfectly cancel out?
    - DiabloD3 5y ago
      Electron is MAX_HATE, Rust is MAX_LOVE, but Discord is more Electron than it is anything. As in, I don't care if Rust runs on their servers if Electron runs on my desktop.
      - jstx1 5y ago
        Yeah, Electron feels more like a choice that matters.
    - kingofclams 5y ago
      Personally I see “Written in rust” as more of a meme, often using buzzwords like “blazing fast” and “memory safe.” Electron is definitely worse than rust is good.
      - mhh__ 5y ago
        > Blazing fast So have you measured it or do you just mean you haven't implemented as many features? -> Usually the latter.
        stouset 5y ago
        Cynicism aside, from what I’ve seen it’s been the former. See regex and rg by burntsushi as an example.
- DennisP 5y ago
  It makes sense to specify the language for open source software. A lot of us are devs who might actually fiddle with the source, if it's written in a language we like to fiddle with.
- CR007 5y ago
  People often use "written in" when they are targeting devs and contributors as no end-user cares about in which jargon we write stuff. In this case, I don't get why they brag as this definitely hits my spaghetti detector: https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database/migrations/scripts.rs https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database...
- deleted 5y ago
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- vlunkr 5y ago
  Also, the backend of Discord is elixir/Erlang, which is a great fit for a messaging app. To me rust would be a step back.
  - steveklabnik 5y ago
    (Discord also uses Rust NIFs with their Elixir)
- deleted 5y ago
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- deleted 5y ago
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anchpop 5y ago
How does it compare to matrix? Would have been nice to use that since it’s an open protocol that already takes privacy seriously
- metasyn 5y ago
  matrix bridge and e2ee are listed in their roadmap, but there aren't a lot of details
- mbrubeck 5y ago
  Their FAQ on “Why no federation?” is relevant: https://developers.revolt.chat/faq/federation https://developers.revolt.chat/faq/federation
  - DocTomoe 5y ago
    > "In terms of the situation, we started the project when none of us even knew what federation was, so it was never even considered from the start." Well, yes, it is honest, but it also is disturbing - which other well-known network principles were unknown to them?
    - Felk 5y ago
      Is it really "disturbing" if it's maintained by mostly college students? If this was done by industry veterans I could understand your stance, but the way things are this feels uncalled for.
      - KitDuncan 5y ago
        I mean it is a little absurd, when everyone on the planet is using email, which is federated...
        prashantsengar 5y ago
        Also absurd that so many of us use SSDs but still don't know what quantum tunneling is...
adrhead 5y ago
Does it offer screen share features and customized stickers?
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Both are planned features
  - gravypod 5y ago
    Do you have any plans for capturing game audio on Windows and Linux? It's very annoying to have to boot into Windows if I want to stream a game with audio to some friends.
    - hammyhavoc 5y ago
      Element (uses Matrix protocol) can capture Pipewire as of a few days ago.
    - Zomatree 5y ago
      screen share wont be a feature for a while, but the hope is to capture game audio as well
platz 5y ago
Giving this project such a politically charged name is a bit cringey. It could turn some people off who would otherwise be interested. Unless of course you're only interested in targeting a more narrow group to begin with. That's ok to, it just potentially limits the reach of the user pool. For an app whos success will be governed by 'network effects', it helps to cast that net as wide as possible instead of narrowing it.
- kodah 5y ago
  https://revolt.chat/about https://revolt.chat/about They're marketing to a privacy aware audience which is, unfortunately these days, political to some.
  - platz 5y ago
    Ok having read the about page, it starts to tell a narrative. It's helpful and gives me a better idea about the motivations behind thebproject, but as a brand name you dont get to force everyone to read your /about when they first see the name Revolt. But on the specific issue, consider if someone is a proponent for privacy, but isn't sure if the're joining software created by activists they disagree with, maybe the equivalent of the folks behind Gab, for example.
    - uselesscynicism 5y ago
      >consider if someone is a proponent for privacy, but isn't sure if the're joining software created by activists they disagree with .. the folks behind Gab Gab is a hilarious example because it is a non-federating fork of Mastodon.[0][1] This is especially noteworthy because the ActivityPub "Fediverse" is full of antipathy between camps of users who run Mastodon (more Left) and those who instead run Pleroma (more Right) to the point where you can predict a user's politics by the software their homeserver is running. Is this the future of FOSS that we want? If you support the right of individuals to run social networks, and if you believe in libre software, you have to understand that sometimes people will use the tools you release for free to do things you disagree with. An analogy: if you're a manufacturer of hammers, you have to accept that someone could use your hammer to commit a murder. [0] https://joinmastodon.org/ https://joinmastodon.org/ [1] https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2019/07/statement-on-gabs-fork-of-mastodon/ https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2019/07/statement-on-gabs-fork...
Shadonototro 5y ago
it's not written in Rust, it is written in Typescript the backend is written in Rust if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine This is something i notice about rust users, they promote "written in Rust" more than the products Very bad marketing
- breakfastduck 5y ago
  I'd wager that in general the crowd frequenting this site are much more interested in what the back-end / protocol is written in than what the web app is.
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    I guess I'm not a part of this "general" then. Solutions should solve a problem. Tech demos should demonstrate tech.
    - breakfastduck 5y ago
      You might not be, hence 'general' and not 'all'... This application solves a problem. An application is more than its front end...
- adamnemecek 5y ago
  > if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine Right, but for a self hosted project this might of interest.
  - Shadonototro 5y ago
    Good point
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  > if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine If you use Discord you probably don't care about self hosting, which a Revolt user might.
donkarma 5y ago
how about a discord-compatible backend?
- hammyhavoc 5y ago
  The advantage being what?
  - evv 5y ago
    Advantage goes to MSFT shareholders.
- DoctorOW 5y ago
  What would be the point? There's explicitly no third-party clients allowed for official Discord.
  - crocodiletears 5y ago
    A Discord compatible backend would allow existing bot frameworks to work with the platform.
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Hi, one of the revolt developers here, We plan to have a built-in discord/matrix/etc bridge.
rusht 5y ago
Curious why you decided to use MongoDB as opposed to HBase or Cassandra? Discord moved away from MongoDB because its sharding is “complicated to use and not known for stability.” Are these issues not relevant anymore?
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Hi, one of the developers here, there was no specific reason why we went mongo at the start, but there have been talks to move to a different database if needed. Currently mongodb is fine for us.
  - hardwaresofton 5y ago
    Just want to suggest that if you're interested in doing this in the future, some investment in defining interfaces up front is worth doing. I took a quick look at the codebase and it looks like mongo is "in there pretty good"[0] without any abstraction to make it easily shimmable. Just a little specification around the that interface (Trait) will go a long way to making other backends possible and should make it much easier to know and manage the API contract a capable database must provide. [0]: https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database/mod.rs https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database...
  - vorpalhex 5y ago
    > Currently mongodb is fine for us. As someone who has administered too many MongoDBs, those are some famous last words.
    - mrits 5y ago
      Cassandra or HBase are not exactly a utopia either though
      - baq 5y ago
        discord has a good writeup of their migration from mongo to cassandra. https://blog.discord.com/how-discord-stores-billions-of-messages-7fa6ec7ee4c7 https://blog.discord.com/how-discord-stores-billions-of-mess...
drcursor 5y ago
Nothing on the Roadmap [1] about encryption. [1] https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap
- busterarm 5y ago
  written in Rust! don't forget to `curl https://sh.rustup.rs https://sh.rustup.rs | sh`! Footnote: As the Rust community continues to bash everyone over the head about how safe it is while completely fucking up the 101 shit we've all been saying not to do for over 20 years, I'm going to continue to treat it how it smells.
  - zamadatix 5y ago
    At the risk of replying to an overtly aggressive post on language bashing nonetheless - can you explain why rustups implementation of `curl https://sh.rustup.rs https://sh.rustup.rs | sh` is worth mentioning? My understanding, from the 1,000 other times these flames start, is it's done properly and no more dangerous than any other way of running 3rd party binaries from a remote source. Regardless of any other thoughts on Rust folks I'll tip my hat to them for they definitely have made talking about security more common... one way or another apparently :).
    - busterarm 5y ago
      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6650987 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6650987 https://blog.dijit.sh//don-t-pipe-curl-to-bash https://blog.dijit.sh//don-t-pipe-curl-to-bash https://sysdig.com/blog/friends-dont-let-friends-curl-bash/ https://sysdig.com/blog/friends-dont-let-friends-curl-bash/ https://www.seancassidy.me/dont-pipe-to-your-shell.html https://www.seancassidy.me/dont-pipe-to-your-shell.html
      - steveklabnik 5y ago
        Many of the things in this link are avoided by our script. For example, that last one is made impossible by putting the contents of what is to be executed in a function, and then invoking that function at the end. If the connection closes early, nothing will be executed. The last ones are the same as any other way of downloading software that's executable, and not specific to curl | bash.
option_greek 5y ago
Can the backend be used alone with a custom frontend (or any plans to convert backend to a SDK) ?
- nicoburns 5y ago
  I believe it can. The protocol seems pretty thoroughly documented https://developers.revolt.chat/ https://developers.revolt.chat/
IceWreck 5y ago
How is bot support ? (Or just regular accounts that can send messages using APIs and not GUI clients) I run an instance of matrix for alert bots only but Synapse is too heavy and Dendrite is focusing too much on federation and less of chat related features.
- nabakin 5y ago
  It doesn't seem like they have explicit bot support yet given their roadmap[1]. It's supposed to be in their next update though. [1] https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap
- KitDuncan 5y ago
  What about Conduit? Recently entered beta and is also written in rust. https://conduit.rs/ https://conduit.rs/
  - stiltzkin 5y ago
    Some screenshots and features of Conduit would be nice.
    - maturz 5y ago
      It's a server, here are clients for it https://matrix.org/clients/ https://matrix.org/clients/ (with pictures). Features https://matrix.org/discover/ https://matrix.org/discover/
      - stiltzkin 5y ago
        I understand now thanks.
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Hi one of the developers here, bot support does exist, we have multiple libraries in different languages you can use, checkout https://github.com/insertish/awesome-revolt https://github.com/insertish/awesome-revolt
arkh 5y ago
I don't see anything in the roadmap about being able to listen to multiple voice channels and setup different push-to-talk keys to speak in specific channels. So it feels like nothing more than another discord clone.
hammyhavoc 5y ago
Instead of yet another app/platform, why not Matrix protocol?
- kevincox 5y ago
  Especially interesting as they intend to support a matrix bridge: https://revolt.chat/roadmap#checkbox40 https://revolt.chat/roadmap#checkbox40. It seems like it would be easier to just use Matrix "natively" and then you also have a mostly-working Discord bridge for free. Plus the likely value here is largely the client, so you can consider reusing, or at least building on top of an existing matrix server.
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    Completely agreed.
  - rglullis 5y ago
    Another interesting point is that Conduit (Rust-based implementation of the Matrix homeserver) got a beta release last week.
    - hammyhavoc 5y ago
      I'm closely following Conduit and Dendrite. Running a Synapse server currently. Staying on topic, Dendrite is written in Rust, meant to be super performant. Stoked for hybrid-P2P via Bluetooth LE for offline usage. Edit: looks like I got confused. Conduit is written in Rust. Ssenica was right, Dendrite is written in Go. To coffee I go!
      - sseneca 5y ago
        Dendrite is written in Go, Conduit is written in Rust
        hammyhavoc 5y ago
        Oops! Well spotted! Edited my comment to reflect that.
pndy 5y ago
Alternatives are always a great thing but I wonder already about survival of this application. Were you guys thinking about any monetization plans already or maybe you going to ask community for support, or you have other ideas if of course such will be needed? Also, the scrollbar on roadmap page in desktop Vivaldi version doesn't seem to be doing anything.
Jyaif 5y ago
From what I've seen, the quality of the experience is astounding. Well done! To the Revolt developers: I believe your "Verify your Revolt account" email contains a link that can only be clicked once. I've heard that gmail (and other email clients) automatically visit the links of email, so that may cause some problems.
- Felk 5y ago
  I've heard that too. But I am using gmail and had no trouble registering.
_han 5y ago
From the website, it is unclear to me what the business model will be in the future. Will you go for a model similar to what GitLab does?
tiagod 5y ago
Considering the Discord backend uses a bunch of Erlang/OTP AFAIK, I'm not sure Rust is an upgrade.
- mcintyre1994 5y ago
  They also use Rust when they hit the limits of the BEAM in specific ways, eg. this is a great read: https://blog.discord.com/using-rust-to-scale-elixir-for-11-million-concurrent-users-c6f19fc029d3 https://blog.discord.com/using-rust-to-scale-elixir-for-11-m...
jpxw 5y ago
I hate the name personally. I would not feel comfortable asking a normal person (or, now that I think about it, even someone tech-savvy and privacy conscious) “hey come and join my Revolt server”. At best, it sounds like I’d be inviting them to play some online game.
- travisgriggs 5y ago
  It’s not like the term “discord” didn’t invite allusions along the same vector. In this regard, the “namers” chose a name that did a hat tip to the original term and communicated “but more!” That said, not a fan of either name myself. The ad hoc poll going forward for funsies could be: if/when you the reader do a discord clone, which language will you be bragging it’s done in, and which name will you be choosing for your project?
- notthemessiah 5y ago
  Honestly, I find it better than naming a chat protocol "Matrix", which either brings to mind the movie or the mathematical structure (it also makes it a pain to search for and distinguish from linear algebra libraries). I'm more bothered by the laziness of using a thesaurus on a competing product which was badly named to begin with (Element was previously Riot). I'd rather have it some nonsensical (Zulip, Jitsi) or misspelled something, partially descriptive (Rocket.chat), or better yet based on a portmanteau (Talkyard, Mattermost) or some kind of clever wordplay.
- tvararu 5y ago
  I am surprised nobody in this comments section has mentioned "Re-Volt" (1999) yet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Re-Volt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Re-Volt
deleted 5y ago
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k_ 5y ago
Have been using another discord alternative, ripcord [0] for a while (with native (Qt) UI instead of electron). Recently we ripcord users keep getting soft banned from discord (have to reset our password) [1], is it something this project also suffers from? [0]: https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ [1]: https://dev.cancel.fm/tktview?name=8f8ecd4b60 https://dev.cancel.fm/tktview?name=8f8ecd4b60
- Operyl 5y ago
  As far as I can tell this isn’t a discord client, but a full on server and client project that feels like Discord.
  - k_ 5y ago
    ... my bad I missed this entirely.
- judge2020 5y ago
  Discord explicitly disallows third-party clients, and will outright ban you if it detects API usage that obviously originates from self-bots (eg. posting embeds as a regular user). The ripcord ban might be a temporary ban more reliant on heuristics intended to prevent nitro scams like this one[0] where it performs no out-of-the-ordinary API calls but still purchases a bunch of Nitro gifts. 0: https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360068385152--Claim-your-nitro-bot-scam https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/3600683...
  - zorkian 5y ago
    I run the infrastructure department at Discord which includes our anti-spam engineering team -- Just want to +1 what you're saying and confirm that we are never trying to ban third party clients (that aren't self-bots). Honestly, it would be a waste of our time and basically do nothing good for Discord. But as you correctly point out, they do sometimes trip the ever-evolving heuristics we build that try to identify and mitigate spam on the platform. If this happens to your account you can write in to our TNS team at https://dis.gd/request https://dis.gd/request and they will usually take care of unbanning any accounts that get accidentally caught up in a spam heuristic. It sometimes takes a bit to investigate and respond to these kinds of requests but they generally come out right in the end.
HoppyHaus 5y ago
Finally, something that outright says that its intent is to be a discord alternative. So many platforms try to sell themselves on some other feature, rather than just being open source and self-hostable. So many things, like Matrix, come close, but lack key components to really competing, such as voice channels rather than calls. I hope this goes somewhere!
- Arathorn 5y ago
  The whole "matrix doesn't have voice channels" thing is a bit frustrating, because... in Element, you can hit the voice or video call button in any channel (not just voice channels!) and it will spin up a voice/video conference in that channel. If you then switch channel, you'll stay in the original conference, unless you drop and rejoin the new one. I think that's basically precisely the same capability as you get in Discord - except in Discord you can switch between the 'voice rooms' by clicking on them in the room list, rather than 'opting in' to the one in your current room. Also, you can do toggle mute via hotkey (which we have a draft for at https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/2280 https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/2280), but this is surely a bonus feature. So, am I right in saying that Element effectively has voice/video rooms today - it's just that the UI is very subtly different to Discord? Or am I completely misunderstanding something fundamental about Discord's voice rooms?
  - meibo 5y ago
    The difference is that Discord voice chats work like "meeting rooms". I don't want to call everyone in a channel, I want to see who's already hanging around and join them on a whim. It's not really "calls" per se as you don't actually call anyone and they're not coupled to actual text conversation channels. That's the big UX difference, and it's a big deal for gaming and more casual communities with many participants.
    - lavabiopsy 5y ago
      I haven't used Discord or Matrix in a while so please forgive me if I have this wrong, but just reading this comment and the parent comment, the only difference there seems to be that the Matrix voice room can (optionally) be coupled to a text chat room, whereas Discord cannot do this, and the voice chat rooms there are always separate. That actually seems like Discord is doing worse here, if you were aiming for maximum flexibility. (Maybe you aren't, I don't know)
pkdpic_y9k 5y ago
This might be a dumb question but curious what the issues are with discord? Im a little concerned since I just finally got convinced to start using it.
- Felk 5y ago
  There's nothing wrong with it per se, in fact Discord is very good software, but it being a for-profit company using closed-source code comes with the usual privacy and free-software concerns. For example here's a post on reddit about some privacy concerns with discord: https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/eiicah/trawling_through_my_discord_data_package_after_35/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/eiicah/trawling_th...
sam0x17 5y ago
So is it fully decentralized? Nowhere is this talked about so I assume not. If not, how are they going to pay for servers?
- icy 5y ago
  It's not decentralized and they don't plan to decentralize it.
  - Felk 5y ago
    One thing some may consider "decentralized" is that you can self-host
    - schmorptron 5y ago
      Like TeamSpeak
sergiotapia 5y ago
Why did you guys go out of your way to make the marketing website more restrictive? I can't select any text on the page, or even find out more about your privacy claims. There's a bit of text that looks like a hyperlink but I can't click it.
- deleted 5y ago
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- deleted 5y ago
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Griffinsauce 5y ago
Ugh, don't lock the zoom on a mobile page please, especially if you're going to show tiny desktop screenshots. I was interested, now I've bounced.
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xvilka 5y ago
It's not Rust, it's Electron...
- terafo 5y ago
  Backend is in rust, but I'm disappointed too.
  - ejj28 5y ago
    I really don't understand people who are 'disappointed' with anything that uses Electron. Sure, it's not as performant as a native app, but writing and maintaining a different native app for every platform you wish to target, and then keeping their UIs united, is unreasonable for most people. I'd be more disappointed if they didn't use Electron.
    - terafo 5y ago
      I don't like bad software. Almost every Electron app that I've ever encountered was quite bad. They are laggy. Installers in hundreds of megabytes and installed apps are even bigger than that. Yes, it's not that much on it's own but they compound. Even React Native approach is superior to Electron and it's possible to do better than that while not developing separate native app for every platform.
  - poetaster 5y ago
    QT QML for the win... (ducks)... Seriously, I still like it. But I write apps that run on phones. Including image editing. Electron, even with wasm is just ... no way.
meibo 5y ago
This is super exciting, Discord needs some real competition that is attractive to their current userbase. Good luck :)
mumblemumble 5y ago
Perhaps offtopic, but why is it so common with new tools for the language it's written in, of all things, to be selected as the top selling point?
- steveklabnik 5y ago
  For any open source project, you are marketing as much towards potential developers as you are end-users. Note that their home page doesn't say "Rust" at all. However, on Hacker News, there are potential contributors, and so giving them a bit of information about the project can be useful.
  - schmorptron 5y ago
    This makes a lot of sense to me, and I've never thought of it like this before. Excellent point!
- edem 5y ago
  Rust is such a niche language still that I'd consider it a red flag if I was an investor.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    You would make a bad investor if you can't recognize the writing on the wall.
    - edem 5y ago
      Which is?
      - cthalupa 5y ago
        That Rust has rapidly gone from niche language to powering projects at some of the biggest names in technology, and will almost certainly continue to increase in that marketshare. https://foundation.rust-lang.org/members/ https://foundation.rust-lang.org/members/ just look at the companies that are a part of the foundation.
rnotaro 5y ago
‎Please delete user 01FEY4XQ988G9BYFH45JKQZF5R. Can't even delete our own account....
- Felk 5y ago
  > Please delete user 01FEY4XQ988G9BYFH45JKQZF5R .. . It's one thing to make a valid complain about there not being an automated account deletion feature yet, requiring you to send an email. And even then it's not that bad since it's literally a "mailto:contact@revolt.chat?Subject=Delete my account" link. It's another thing to make a temper tantrum out of it: https://imgur.com/U2DJwm7 https://imgur.com/U2DJwm7 Please don't be the guy that's technically right but an ass about it.
  - vips7L 5y ago
    Not being able to delete your own account yourself is a valid complaint. Having to send an email is 100% not acceptable.
  - rnotaro 5y ago
    They could literally create a #DeleteAccount room on the Revolt "Server" or a specific user/bot that could handle deletion request instead of using emails. (Revolt is literally a communication platform!) I created my account from an email address that could not send emails. (Unless I manually create an alias.) They told me "Well, did you sign up just to delete your account afterward ?, You could look at the screenshot on the homepage." I just wanted to test the platform, I don't need a specific reason to have my account deleted. It reminds me of theses business where you can subscribe through internet but where you need to call them over the phone to cancel the subscription. It was simpler to create a Curl loop to get my account deleted then sending an email.
cassonmars 5y ago
Also working on a Discord alternative, albeit my project is a decentralized version — neat to see the space has traction. One thing I couldn’t quickly surmise: it looks like your services are centralized and neither servers/spaces (whatever terminology you’re using for logical groupings of communities) nor DMs have support for encryption. Do you have plans to support this? I don’t mean to ask this as a FUD spreader, I just am curious how you differentiate from Discord aside from being open source, and similarly, how you intend to ensure your offering stays open source in perpetuity?
- olah_1 5y ago
  Is it that "Howler chat" app? Is it usable today?
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Hi, one of the revolt developers here, we plan to have e2ee on DMs.
  - iruoy 5y ago
    Are group chats going to be encrypted aswell?
    - Zomatree 5y ago
      Group DMs will be encrypted as well
  - fragileone 5y ago
    Any reason why you think groups shouldn't be able to have private chats?
    - Zomatree 5y ago
      Group DMs will be encrypted as well
- antcas 5y ago
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NmAmDa 5y ago
Captcha is not working on Firefox. And it is required at each login.
- ztgasdf 5y ago
  Working for me, Firefox 91.0.2 on Windows 10. Perhaps check your blockers?
  - NmAmDa 5y ago
    Not working on firefox 91.0.2 on Mac even in private mode.
luke2m 5y ago
Would love to see bridging.
- Zomatree 5y ago
  Hi, one of the revolt developers here, bridges between other platforms are planned to be a built-in feature, see the roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap
DantesKite 5y ago
What’s wrong with Discord?
saladuh 5y ago
This is awesome and all, but I don't understand how it will support itself? Unlike Matrix which has plenty of money from government contracts (and venture capitalist money, which kinda sucks but whatever), I don't see how a centralised chat platform with video, voice, data rich messages, etc. relying on donations can support a large user base without one day compromising on privacy respecting data collection. With Matrix, everyone can help share the load by setting up their own homeservers, if they want to. Plus, P2P is going to be part of the protocol at some point with embedded servers in the clients. So what's the monetisation strategy? I wish they were more upfront about that, even if the answer was "we have no idea yet". And if the plan is not to monetise, an answer as to how a centralised server with high demand will keep up with capacity would be appreciated.
husamia 5y ago
please turn off the captcha
jeffo_rulez 5y ago
chrome is blocking password resets due to a CORS issue.
pippy 5y ago
The verify email process has a link to go to your email provider. that's slick.
thih9 5y ago
Discord flagged my account with my main email immediately after registration. Temp email works fine. Support replies with unhelpful canned responses and contacting them didn’t solve my problem. All this is one more reason why an open source alternative is needed and why this is good news.
tirrex 5y ago
How are they going to make money and support the development?
skocznymroczny 5y ago
Aren't you worried about name similarity to Revolut? Or old RC car game Re-volt?
spurgu 5y ago
Nice touch with the "Open [My email provider]" button/link (to confirm your email) after signing up! Haven't seen that anywhere before.

642 points by adamnemecek 5y ago

Github link: https://github.com/revoltchat https://github.com/revoltchat The backend is in Rust, frontend is Typescript.

mirekrusin 5y ago
Repository management and self hosted scripts in Shell. Documentation in HTML and JavaScript. Powered by git. And github. Built in editing in vscode support. Icons in PNG. Badges in SVG!

mathw 5y ago

Not sure "written in Rust" is a headline thing that's worth mentioning anymore. Particularly amusing in this case when parts of Discord are written in Rust too.

drcongo 5y ago
On anything you can self-run it's a very useful qualifier. Personally I ignore anything that says "written in Node" because I don't want those headaches.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  That’s a shame. Node is quite easy to run. Biggest problem is that installing any app includes a free black hole.
  - vaughan 5y ago
    JS and Rust are best friends. Deno is written in Rust. And many Node native libs are being written in Rust.
    - Popegaf 5y ago
      It's not JS or node that's the problem, it's the JS ecosystem. Badly or too broadly defined dependencies can (and do) lead to pulling a new version of a dep that introduced a breaking API change and tada, you have to start hunting for the right version. Most projects don't define the node version that their project runs on either, so what ran in node 8 might not run in node 14 now. What's wonderful to run into is non-JS dependencies: node-gyp happens to be used here and there. Sometimes the native lib will be pulled, sometimes it will be built, who knows why. And node-gyp might then depend on python2 which might not even be present on newer distros anymore. And so on and so forth. If it doesn't come in an AppImage or docker image, there's no chance I'm getting myself into a node mess.
      - vaughan 5y ago
        Yep, I know the pain all too well. ESM is also currently a disaster as many popular packages migrate without transpiling to CJS and you cannot call ESM from CJS contexts. As you said, it's good to separate the ecosystem from the language/runtime. Things will improve over time, but everything has just been in transition for so long. I dream of the day that transpilers are no longer needed and TypeScript is baked in to all browsers. Until then it is a mess. > node-gyp might then depend on python2 `cmake-js` is the preferred option now. And Rust native deps don't have this issue.
  - tluyben2 5y ago
    ... if the application was written recently. Get something from last year on your 'now' computer and let the suffering begin. Without a docker setup, I really find node horrible vs let's say .NET Core, Java/Closure or Go. But ymmv. A project I inherited has node_modules of 780MB with 150k files with many deprecated and vulnerable ones in them pinned versions: I would not call that easy. I never had that with .net: usually you need a few nugets and if you update them, they still work. That I would call easy. I have used both (and java for over 20 years) for 10+ years, I just do not like the ecosystem (or language but that is ok with typescript and purescript and cljs): I have to anyway.
  - vagrantJin 5y ago
    > includes a free black hole. This is gospel at this point. Npmming and yarning are giving me anxiety these days.
- zbrozek 5y ago
  Ditto. It's a good indicator of being a sloppily-written pile of dependencies I don't want to touch. I also discriminate against Electron software, at least as much as I'm able.
- OJFord 5y ago
  It's interesting, I suspect we all have our thing we avoid like that - for me it's Java stuff. I don't say that to 'defend' node, I'm no JS fan boy or particularly experienced with it, it just doesn't bother me the way Java stuff does - the dread I have for a Java stack trace appearing from something I'm trying to run is enough to make me see if there's an equivalent that ticks the same boxes in another language!
  - brabel 5y ago
    These days Java applications are supposed to embed the JVM using jlink images or even native installer (see jpackage). So you shouldn't even know if the app is written in Java when you run it.
    - nick__m 5y ago
      As someone who now does more operation than devloppement, I want my server side Java app to run on a full JVM, attaching jconsle or jstack to a running process is so usefull. No other runtime on Linux gives the observability you get by default when you run on a full JVM. On Windows that another story since you have ETW which is incredible and works with anything. But on Linux, if your application doesn't offer observability, you have to resort to strace and adhoc EBPF that you have to write, to diagnose a missbehaving application in production.
    - vips7L 5y ago
      The problem with jpackage/jlink is that most teams are stuck on an antiquated runtime and those tools didn’t ship until Java 14 (correct me if I’m wrong about the version). My own company is still making new projects on Java 8.
      - brabel 5y ago
        At work, we use some pretty complex stuff in our builds, including linking to C libs, Groovy testing, Kotlin modules, as well as the majority of the code in Java. It took quite a lot of effort, but we managed to move to Java 11 this year. It's great to be able to use new Java language/platform features. We're moving to Java 17 next year once the dust settles (it will be the first LTS release in 3 years and comes up this month - Sep 2021)... it will be a much easier migration as there's nothing like the big Java 9 barrier to cross. I can't understand why anyone would start something new in Java 8, all traditional Java tooling already works really well with Java 11 and even Java 17.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
For me I think “written in Rust”actually does add a lot. It is a signal that this will be easy to build, easy to deploy (because it is compiled into a single binary in general), memory safe, and likely to be written by a someone that cares about performance and efficiency. I think those are all valuable hints.
- spopejoy 5y ago
  > memory safe That's an incorrect assumption if you haven't audited the code. > likely to be written by a someone that cares about performance and efficiency Ah, the stamp of approval that comes from signalling to the "right people". Reminds me of the preamble to almost every C++ Boost library -- "written with performance in mind".
  - adamnemecek 5y ago
    > That's an incorrect assumption if you haven't audited the code. Even without an audit, the odds of a Rust project being memory safe are so much higher than in comparable languages. Furthermore, Rust makes auditing so much easier by allowing you to concentrate on unsafe blocks.
    - cjbprime 5y ago
      That's a confusing statement -- JS/Node and Golang are comparable (memory safe) languages for API server backends.
      - zozbot234 5y ago
        Golang is only memory safe if you're not using the concurrency features. It doesn't protect against data races which can break safety.
        spopejoy 5y ago
        Rust hasn't magically solved concurrency safety either, as linearity is not enough. GC'd languages (Java, Go, Haskell etc) are safer than Rust by default, you just have the tradeoff of GC. Note that this isn't always a tradeoff as GCs can outperform static allocation in scenarios like large dynamic heaps. Haskell is the safest for concurrency because of the strictly typed functional semantics.
onionisafruit 5y ago
Similarly I used to have an issue with the number of projects submitted to /r/golang that are “a whatever server written in go”. If I wanted to see a new whatever server I would be looking elsewhere and wouldn’t particularly care what language it’s implemented with. Nowadays I’ve come around to appreciating the opportunity to see what other gophers are doing. I usually skip over those posts but occasionally I look at the code and learn something new. Even when I’m dealing with compiles binaries, I slightly prefer something written in a language I’m familiar with just so there’s a better chance I will be able to diagnose any bugs I encounter.
bachmeier 5y ago
Totally agree. It's not good for HN to have this kind of repetitive language promotion on the front page. I could see if this was the first major project written in the language, which would make it noteworthy, but something like this needs to stand on its own without the upvotes of Rust fans.
- busterarm 5y ago
  It bothers me that we don't view it as a problem on this board the fact that we have an entire upvote/downvote brigade that reacts purely on whether you're speaking good or ill about Rust. I'm not one to tell moderators what to do but on some boards people get told off severely for such behavior. "x in rust"[1] threads are so prevalent that they should get a ranking penalty. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=%22in%20rust%22&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
  - sodality2 5y ago
    Disagree- three of the first six most recent submissions containing "in rust" are simply educational/about the rust language in general and not showing off a project (while using "rust" as a selling point). https://i.imgur.com/WCD7iem.png https://i.imgur.com/WCD7iem.png
    - jhgb 5y ago
      Why not the fifth entry? That seems similar to the highlighted ones.
      - sodality2 5y ago
        Yep, that one is informative as well. My bad!
- mbreese 5y ago
  This is the way it’s always been though. First it was Java, then Ruby, then Clojure, then Go, then Node, and now Rust. As languages get popular, multiple projects get rewritten in them. At first it’s a novelty, but it is often useful to see what the strengths and weaknesses are of a language to implement an existing project. Eventually, it becomes annoying to have “written in X” attached to articles and links, but soon, that will diminish. The only time when I think it’s really appropriate for a mature language is when the language itself is a feature. But that is really rare for that to be the case. Other languages (eg Python, Haskell and Erlang) are in the mix too, but more evenly distributed and less fad-ish. This is just part of the hype cycle of languages. I’m not saying Rust is only a fad, but we are definitely in that part of the cycle for Rust.
nabakin 5y ago
Yeah that makes sense. Revolt was posted to r/Rust yesterday so OP is probably a person who frequents r/Rust and thought it was notable.
marsven_422 5y ago
It's good it say rust since I fail the "correct political opinion" test for using rust I will be unable to install it.
axegon_ 5y ago
Exactly what I said yesterday in a different thread: > One thing that makes me appreciate it even more is the fact that it's written in rust without the authors trying to make it into a primary selling point, which is annoyingly common in these days("X written in rust").
jedisct1 5y ago
This is getting very lousy.
hestefisk 5y ago
But apart from the advertisement of language choice, an OSS alternative is quite good, no? I’d be keen to try it out.
timdorr 5y ago
Also, only the backend is written in Rust. The desktop client is an Electron app: https://github.com/revoltchat/desktop https://github.com/revoltchat/desktop
- jstx1 5y ago
  Now I want to know if HN hates Electron more than it loves Rust. Or do they perfectly cancel out?
  - DiabloD3 5y ago
    Electron is MAX_HATE, Rust is MAX_LOVE, but Discord is more Electron than it is anything. As in, I don't care if Rust runs on their servers if Electron runs on my desktop.
    - jstx1 5y ago
      Yeah, Electron feels more like a choice that matters.
  - kingofclams 5y ago
    Personally I see “Written in rust” as more of a meme, often using buzzwords like “blazing fast” and “memory safe.” Electron is definitely worse than rust is good.
    - mhh__ 5y ago
      > Blazing fast So have you measured it or do you just mean you haven't implemented as many features? -> Usually the latter.
      - stouset 5y ago
        Cynicism aside, from what I’ve seen it’s been the former. See regex and rg by burntsushi as an example.
DennisP 5y ago
It makes sense to specify the language for open source software. A lot of us are devs who might actually fiddle with the source, if it's written in a language we like to fiddle with.
CR007 5y ago
People often use "written in" when they are targeting devs and contributors as no end-user cares about in which jargon we write stuff. In this case, I don't get why they brag as this definitely hits my spaghetti detector: https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database/migrations/scripts.rs https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database...
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vlunkr 5y ago
Also, the backend of Discord is elixir/Erlang, which is a great fit for a messaging app. To me rust would be a step back.
- steveklabnik 5y ago
  (Discord also uses Rust NIFs with their Elixir)
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anchpop 5y ago

How does it compare to matrix? Would have been nice to use that since it’s an open protocol that already takes privacy seriously

metasyn 5y ago
matrix bridge and e2ee are listed in their roadmap, but there aren't a lot of details
mbrubeck 5y ago
Their FAQ on “Why no federation?” is relevant: https://developers.revolt.chat/faq/federation https://developers.revolt.chat/faq/federation
- DocTomoe 5y ago
  > "In terms of the situation, we started the project when none of us even knew what federation was, so it was never even considered from the start." Well, yes, it is honest, but it also is disturbing - which other well-known network principles were unknown to them?
  - Felk 5y ago
    Is it really "disturbing" if it's maintained by mostly college students? If this was done by industry veterans I could understand your stance, but the way things are this feels uncalled for.
    - KitDuncan 5y ago
      I mean it is a little absurd, when everyone on the planet is using email, which is federated...
      - prashantsengar 5y ago
        Also absurd that so many of us use SSDs but still don't know what quantum tunneling is...

adrhead 5y ago

Does it offer screen share features and customized stickers?

Zomatree 5y ago
Both are planned features
- gravypod 5y ago
  Do you have any plans for capturing game audio on Windows and Linux? It's very annoying to have to boot into Windows if I want to stream a game with audio to some friends.
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    Element (uses Matrix protocol) can capture Pipewire as of a few days ago.
  - Zomatree 5y ago
    screen share wont be a feature for a while, but the hope is to capture game audio as well

platz 5y ago

Giving this project such a politically charged name is a bit cringey. It could turn some people off who would otherwise be interested. Unless of course you're only interested in targeting a more narrow group to begin with. That's ok to, it just potentially limits the reach of the user pool. For an app whos success will be governed by 'network effects', it helps to cast that net as wide as possible instead of narrowing it.

kodah 5y ago
https://revolt.chat/about https://revolt.chat/about They're marketing to a privacy aware audience which is, unfortunately these days, political to some.
- platz 5y ago
  Ok having read the about page, it starts to tell a narrative. It's helpful and gives me a better idea about the motivations behind thebproject, but as a brand name you dont get to force everyone to read your /about when they first see the name Revolt. But on the specific issue, consider if someone is a proponent for privacy, but isn't sure if the're joining software created by activists they disagree with, maybe the equivalent of the folks behind Gab, for example.
  - uselesscynicism 5y ago
    >consider if someone is a proponent for privacy, but isn't sure if the're joining software created by activists they disagree with .. the folks behind Gab Gab is a hilarious example because it is a non-federating fork of Mastodon.[0][1] This is especially noteworthy because the ActivityPub "Fediverse" is full of antipathy between camps of users who run Mastodon (more Left) and those who instead run Pleroma (more Right) to the point where you can predict a user's politics by the software their homeserver is running. Is this the future of FOSS that we want? If you support the right of individuals to run social networks, and if you believe in libre software, you have to understand that sometimes people will use the tools you release for free to do things you disagree with. An analogy: if you're a manufacturer of hammers, you have to accept that someone could use your hammer to commit a murder. [0] https://joinmastodon.org/ https://joinmastodon.org/ [1] https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2019/07/statement-on-gabs-fork-of-mastodon/ https://blog.joinmastodon.org/2019/07/statement-on-gabs-fork...

Shadonototro 5y ago

it's not written in Rust, it is written in Typescript the backend is written in Rust if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine This is something i notice about rust users, they promote "written in Rust" more than the products Very bad marketing

breakfastduck 5y ago
I'd wager that in general the crowd frequenting this site are much more interested in what the back-end / protocol is written in than what the web app is.
- hammyhavoc 5y ago
  I guess I'm not a part of this "general" then. Solutions should solve a problem. Tech demos should demonstrate tech.
  - breakfastduck 5y ago
    You might not be, hence 'general' and not 'all'... This application solves a problem. An application is more than its front end...
adamnemecek 5y ago
> if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine Right, but for a self hosted project this might of interest.
- Shadonototro 5y ago
  Good point
robertlagrant 5y ago
> if you use Discord, you don't care about the backend, it doesn't run on your machine If you use Discord you probably don't care about self hosting, which a Revolt user might.

donkarma 5y ago

how about a discord-compatible backend?

hammyhavoc 5y ago
The advantage being what?
- evv 5y ago
  Advantage goes to MSFT shareholders.
DoctorOW 5y ago
What would be the point? There's explicitly no third-party clients allowed for official Discord.
- crocodiletears 5y ago
  A Discord compatible backend would allow existing bot frameworks to work with the platform.
Zomatree 5y ago
Hi, one of the revolt developers here, We plan to have a built-in discord/matrix/etc bridge.

rusht 5y ago

Curious why you decided to use MongoDB as opposed to HBase or Cassandra? Discord moved away from MongoDB because its sharding is “complicated to use and not known for stability.” Are these issues not relevant anymore?

Zomatree 5y ago
Hi, one of the developers here, there was no specific reason why we went mongo at the start, but there have been talks to move to a different database if needed. Currently mongodb is fine for us.
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  Just want to suggest that if you're interested in doing this in the future, some investment in defining interfaces up front is worth doing. I took a quick look at the codebase and it looks like mongo is "in there pretty good"[0] without any abstraction to make it easily shimmable. Just a little specification around the that interface (Trait) will go a long way to making other backends possible and should make it much easier to know and manage the API contract a capable database must provide. [0]: https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database/mod.rs https://github.com/revoltchat/delta/blob/master/src/database...
- vorpalhex 5y ago
  > Currently mongodb is fine for us. As someone who has administered too many MongoDBs, those are some famous last words.
  - mrits 5y ago
    Cassandra or HBase are not exactly a utopia either though
    - baq 5y ago
      discord has a good writeup of their migration from mongo to cassandra. https://blog.discord.com/how-discord-stores-billions-of-messages-7fa6ec7ee4c7 https://blog.discord.com/how-discord-stores-billions-of-mess...

drcursor 5y ago

Nothing on the Roadmap [1] about encryption. [1] https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap

busterarm 5y ago
written in Rust! don't forget to `curl https://sh.rustup.rs https://sh.rustup.rs | sh`! Footnote: As the Rust community continues to bash everyone over the head about how safe it is while completely fucking up the 101 shit we've all been saying not to do for over 20 years, I'm going to continue to treat it how it smells.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  At the risk of replying to an overtly aggressive post on language bashing nonetheless - can you explain why rustups implementation of `curl https://sh.rustup.rs https://sh.rustup.rs | sh` is worth mentioning? My understanding, from the 1,000 other times these flames start, is it's done properly and no more dangerous than any other way of running 3rd party binaries from a remote source. Regardless of any other thoughts on Rust folks I'll tip my hat to them for they definitely have made talking about security more common... one way or another apparently :).
  - busterarm 5y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6650987 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6650987 https://blog.dijit.sh//don-t-pipe-curl-to-bash https://blog.dijit.sh//don-t-pipe-curl-to-bash https://sysdig.com/blog/friends-dont-let-friends-curl-bash/ https://sysdig.com/blog/friends-dont-let-friends-curl-bash/ https://www.seancassidy.me/dont-pipe-to-your-shell.html https://www.seancassidy.me/dont-pipe-to-your-shell.html
    - steveklabnik 5y ago
      Many of the things in this link are avoided by our script. For example, that last one is made impossible by putting the contents of what is to be executed in a function, and then invoking that function at the end. If the connection closes early, nothing will be executed. The last ones are the same as any other way of downloading software that's executable, and not specific to curl | bash.

option_greek 5y ago

Can the backend be used alone with a custom frontend (or any plans to convert backend to a SDK) ?

nicoburns 5y ago
I believe it can. The protocol seems pretty thoroughly documented https://developers.revolt.chat/ https://developers.revolt.chat/

IceWreck 5y ago

How is bot support ? (Or just regular accounts that can send messages using APIs and not GUI clients) I run an instance of matrix for alert bots only but Synapse is too heavy and Dendrite is focusing too much on federation and less of chat related features.

nabakin 5y ago
It doesn't seem like they have explicit bot support yet given their roadmap[1]. It's supposed to be in their next update though. [1] https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap
KitDuncan 5y ago
What about Conduit? Recently entered beta and is also written in rust. https://conduit.rs/ https://conduit.rs/
- stiltzkin 5y ago
  Some screenshots and features of Conduit would be nice.
  - maturz 5y ago
    It's a server, here are clients for it https://matrix.org/clients/ https://matrix.org/clients/ (with pictures). Features https://matrix.org/discover/ https://matrix.org/discover/
    - stiltzkin 5y ago
      I understand now thanks.
Zomatree 5y ago
Hi one of the developers here, bot support does exist, we have multiple libraries in different languages you can use, checkout https://github.com/insertish/awesome-revolt https://github.com/insertish/awesome-revolt

arkh 5y ago

I don't see anything in the roadmap about being able to listen to multiple voice channels and setup different push-to-talk keys to speak in specific channels. So it feels like nothing more than another discord clone.

hammyhavoc 5y ago

Instead of yet another app/platform, why not Matrix protocol?

kevincox 5y ago
Especially interesting as they intend to support a matrix bridge: https://revolt.chat/roadmap#checkbox40 https://revolt.chat/roadmap#checkbox40. It seems like it would be easier to just use Matrix "natively" and then you also have a mostly-working Discord bridge for free. Plus the likely value here is largely the client, so you can consider reusing, or at least building on top of an existing matrix server.
- hammyhavoc 5y ago
  Completely agreed.
- rglullis 5y ago
  Another interesting point is that Conduit (Rust-based implementation of the Matrix homeserver) got a beta release last week.
  - hammyhavoc 5y ago
    I'm closely following Conduit and Dendrite. Running a Synapse server currently. Staying on topic, Dendrite is written in Rust, meant to be super performant. Stoked for hybrid-P2P via Bluetooth LE for offline usage. Edit: looks like I got confused. Conduit is written in Rust. Ssenica was right, Dendrite is written in Go. To coffee I go!
    - sseneca 5y ago
      Dendrite is written in Go, Conduit is written in Rust
      - hammyhavoc 5y ago
        Oops! Well spotted! Edited my comment to reflect that.

pndy 5y ago

Alternatives are always a great thing but I wonder already about survival of this application. Were you guys thinking about any monetization plans already or maybe you going to ask community for support, or you have other ideas if of course such will be needed? Also, the scrollbar on roadmap page in desktop Vivaldi version doesn't seem to be doing anything.

Jyaif 5y ago

From what I've seen, the quality of the experience is astounding. Well done! To the Revolt developers: I believe your "Verify your Revolt account" email contains a link that can only be clicked once. I've heard that gmail (and other email clients) automatically visit the links of email, so that may cause some problems.

Felk 5y ago
I've heard that too. But I am using gmail and had no trouble registering.

_han 5y ago

From the website, it is unclear to me what the business model will be in the future. Will you go for a model similar to what GitLab does?

tiagod 5y ago

Considering the Discord backend uses a bunch of Erlang/OTP AFAIK, I'm not sure Rust is an upgrade.

mcintyre1994 5y ago
They also use Rust when they hit the limits of the BEAM in specific ways, eg. this is a great read: https://blog.discord.com/using-rust-to-scale-elixir-for-11-million-concurrent-users-c6f19fc029d3 https://blog.discord.com/using-rust-to-scale-elixir-for-11-m...

jpxw 5y ago

I hate the name personally. I would not feel comfortable asking a normal person (or, now that I think about it, even someone tech-savvy and privacy conscious) “hey come and join my Revolt server”. At best, it sounds like I’d be inviting them to play some online game.

travisgriggs 5y ago
It’s not like the term “discord” didn’t invite allusions along the same vector. In this regard, the “namers” chose a name that did a hat tip to the original term and communicated “but more!” That said, not a fan of either name myself. The ad hoc poll going forward for funsies could be: if/when you the reader do a discord clone, which language will you be bragging it’s done in, and which name will you be choosing for your project?
notthemessiah 5y ago
Honestly, I find it better than naming a chat protocol "Matrix", which either brings to mind the movie or the mathematical structure (it also makes it a pain to search for and distinguish from linear algebra libraries). I'm more bothered by the laziness of using a thesaurus on a competing product which was badly named to begin with (Element was previously Riot). I'd rather have it some nonsensical (Zulip, Jitsi) or misspelled something, partially descriptive (Rocket.chat), or better yet based on a portmanteau (Talkyard, Mattermost) or some kind of clever wordplay.
tvararu 5y ago
I am surprised nobody in this comments section has mentioned "Re-Volt" (1999) yet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Re-Volt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Re-Volt

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k_ 5y ago

Have been using another discord alternative, ripcord [0] for a while (with native (Qt) UI instead of electron). Recently we ripcord users keep getting soft banned from discord (have to reset our password) [1], is it something this project also suffers from? [0]: https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ https://cancel.fm/ripcord/ [1]: https://dev.cancel.fm/tktview?name=8f8ecd4b60 https://dev.cancel.fm/tktview?name=8f8ecd4b60

Operyl 5y ago
As far as I can tell this isn’t a discord client, but a full on server and client project that feels like Discord.
- k_ 5y ago
  ... my bad I missed this entirely.
judge2020 5y ago
Discord explicitly disallows third-party clients, and will outright ban you if it detects API usage that obviously originates from self-bots (eg. posting embeds as a regular user). The ripcord ban might be a temporary ban more reliant on heuristics intended to prevent nitro scams like this one[0] where it performs no out-of-the-ordinary API calls but still purchases a bunch of Nitro gifts. 0: https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360068385152--Claim-your-nitro-bot-scam https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/3600683...
- zorkian 5y ago
  I run the infrastructure department at Discord which includes our anti-spam engineering team -- Just want to +1 what you're saying and confirm that we are never trying to ban third party clients (that aren't self-bots). Honestly, it would be a waste of our time and basically do nothing good for Discord. But as you correctly point out, they do sometimes trip the ever-evolving heuristics we build that try to identify and mitigate spam on the platform. If this happens to your account you can write in to our TNS team at https://dis.gd/request https://dis.gd/request and they will usually take care of unbanning any accounts that get accidentally caught up in a spam heuristic. It sometimes takes a bit to investigate and respond to these kinds of requests but they generally come out right in the end.

HoppyHaus 5y ago

Finally, something that outright says that its intent is to be a discord alternative. So many platforms try to sell themselves on some other feature, rather than just being open source and self-hostable. So many things, like Matrix, come close, but lack key components to really competing, such as voice channels rather than calls. I hope this goes somewhere!

Arathorn 5y ago
The whole "matrix doesn't have voice channels" thing is a bit frustrating, because... in Element, you can hit the voice or video call button in any channel (not just voice channels!) and it will spin up a voice/video conference in that channel. If you then switch channel, you'll stay in the original conference, unless you drop and rejoin the new one. I think that's basically precisely the same capability as you get in Discord - except in Discord you can switch between the 'voice rooms' by clicking on them in the room list, rather than 'opting in' to the one in your current room. Also, you can do toggle mute via hotkey (which we have a draft for at https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/2280 https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/2280), but this is surely a bonus feature. So, am I right in saying that Element effectively has voice/video rooms today - it's just that the UI is very subtly different to Discord? Or am I completely misunderstanding something fundamental about Discord's voice rooms?
- meibo 5y ago
  The difference is that Discord voice chats work like "meeting rooms". I don't want to call everyone in a channel, I want to see who's already hanging around and join them on a whim. It's not really "calls" per se as you don't actually call anyone and they're not coupled to actual text conversation channels. That's the big UX difference, and it's a big deal for gaming and more casual communities with many participants.
  - lavabiopsy 5y ago
    I haven't used Discord or Matrix in a while so please forgive me if I have this wrong, but just reading this comment and the parent comment, the only difference there seems to be that the Matrix voice room can (optionally) be coupled to a text chat room, whereas Discord cannot do this, and the voice chat rooms there are always separate. That actually seems like Discord is doing worse here, if you were aiming for maximum flexibility. (Maybe you aren't, I don't know)

pkdpic_y9k 5y ago

This might be a dumb question but curious what the issues are with discord? Im a little concerned since I just finally got convinced to start using it.

Felk 5y ago
There's nothing wrong with it per se, in fact Discord is very good software, but it being a for-profit company using closed-source code comes with the usual privacy and free-software concerns. For example here's a post on reddit about some privacy concerns with discord: https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/eiicah/trawling_through_my_discord_data_package_after_35/ https://old.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/eiicah/trawling_th...

sam0x17 5y ago

So is it fully decentralized? Nowhere is this talked about so I assume not. If not, how are they going to pay for servers?

icy 5y ago
It's not decentralized and they don't plan to decentralize it.
- Felk 5y ago
  One thing some may consider "decentralized" is that you can self-host
  - schmorptron 5y ago
    Like TeamSpeak

sergiotapia 5y ago

Why did you guys go out of your way to make the marketing website more restrictive? I can't select any text on the page, or even find out more about your privacy claims. There's a bit of text that looks like a hyperlink but I can't click it.

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Griffinsauce 5y ago

Ugh, don't lock the zoom on a mobile page please, especially if you're going to show tiny desktop screenshots. I was interested, now I've bounced.

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xvilka 5y ago

It's not Rust, it's Electron...

terafo 5y ago
Backend is in rust, but I'm disappointed too.
- ejj28 5y ago
  I really don't understand people who are 'disappointed' with anything that uses Electron. Sure, it's not as performant as a native app, but writing and maintaining a different native app for every platform you wish to target, and then keeping their UIs united, is unreasonable for most people. I'd be more disappointed if they didn't use Electron.
  - terafo 5y ago
    I don't like bad software. Almost every Electron app that I've ever encountered was quite bad. They are laggy. Installers in hundreds of megabytes and installed apps are even bigger than that. Yes, it's not that much on it's own but they compound. Even React Native approach is superior to Electron and it's possible to do better than that while not developing separate native app for every platform.
- poetaster 5y ago
  QT QML for the win... (ducks)... Seriously, I still like it. But I write apps that run on phones. Including image editing. Electron, even with wasm is just ... no way.

meibo 5y ago

This is super exciting, Discord needs some real competition that is attractive to their current userbase. Good luck :)

mumblemumble 5y ago

Perhaps offtopic, but why is it so common with new tools for the language it's written in, of all things, to be selected as the top selling point?

steveklabnik 5y ago
For any open source project, you are marketing as much towards potential developers as you are end-users. Note that their home page doesn't say "Rust" at all. However, on Hacker News, there are potential contributors, and so giving them a bit of information about the project can be useful.
- schmorptron 5y ago
  This makes a lot of sense to me, and I've never thought of it like this before. Excellent point!
edem 5y ago
Rust is such a niche language still that I'd consider it a red flag if I was an investor.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  You would make a bad investor if you can't recognize the writing on the wall.
  - edem 5y ago
    Which is?
    - cthalupa 5y ago
      That Rust has rapidly gone from niche language to powering projects at some of the biggest names in technology, and will almost certainly continue to increase in that marketshare. https://foundation.rust-lang.org/members/ https://foundation.rust-lang.org/members/ just look at the companies that are a part of the foundation.

rnotaro 5y ago

‎Please delete user 01FEY4XQ988G9BYFH45JKQZF5R. Can't even delete our own account....

Felk 5y ago
> Please delete user 01FEY4XQ988G9BYFH45JKQZF5R .. . It's one thing to make a valid complain about there not being an automated account deletion feature yet, requiring you to send an email. And even then it's not that bad since it's literally a "mailto:contact@revolt.chat?Subject=Delete my account" link. It's another thing to make a temper tantrum out of it: https://imgur.com/U2DJwm7 https://imgur.com/U2DJwm7 Please don't be the guy that's technically right but an ass about it.
- vips7L 5y ago
  Not being able to delete your own account yourself is a valid complaint. Having to send an email is 100% not acceptable.
- rnotaro 5y ago
  They could literally create a #DeleteAccount room on the Revolt "Server" or a specific user/bot that could handle deletion request instead of using emails. (Revolt is literally a communication platform!) I created my account from an email address that could not send emails. (Unless I manually create an alias.) They told me "Well, did you sign up just to delete your account afterward ?, You could look at the screenshot on the homepage." I just wanted to test the platform, I don't need a specific reason to have my account deleted. It reminds me of theses business where you can subscribe through internet but where you need to call them over the phone to cancel the subscription. It was simpler to create a Curl loop to get my account deleted then sending an email.

cassonmars 5y ago

Also working on a Discord alternative, albeit my project is a decentralized version — neat to see the space has traction. One thing I couldn’t quickly surmise: it looks like your services are centralized and neither servers/spaces (whatever terminology you’re using for logical groupings of communities) nor DMs have support for encryption. Do you have plans to support this? I don’t mean to ask this as a FUD spreader, I just am curious how you differentiate from Discord aside from being open source, and similarly, how you intend to ensure your offering stays open source in perpetuity?

olah_1 5y ago
Is it that "Howler chat" app? Is it usable today?
Zomatree 5y ago
Hi, one of the revolt developers here, we plan to have e2ee on DMs.
- iruoy 5y ago
  Are group chats going to be encrypted aswell?
  - Zomatree 5y ago
    Group DMs will be encrypted as well
- fragileone 5y ago
  Any reason why you think groups shouldn't be able to have private chats?
  - Zomatree 5y ago
    Group DMs will be encrypted as well
antcas 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

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NmAmDa 5y ago

Captcha is not working on Firefox. And it is required at each login.

ztgasdf 5y ago
Working for me, Firefox 91.0.2 on Windows 10. Perhaps check your blockers?
- NmAmDa 5y ago
  Not working on firefox 91.0.2 on Mac even in private mode.

luke2m 5y ago

Would love to see bridging.

Zomatree 5y ago
Hi, one of the revolt developers here, bridges between other platforms are planned to be a built-in feature, see the roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap https://revolt.chat/roadmap

DantesKite 5y ago

What’s wrong with Discord?

saladuh 5y ago

This is awesome and all, but I don't understand how it will support itself? Unlike Matrix which has plenty of money from government contracts (and venture capitalist money, which kinda sucks but whatever), I don't see how a centralised chat platform with video, voice, data rich messages, etc. relying on donations can support a large user base without one day compromising on privacy respecting data collection. With Matrix, everyone can help share the load by setting up their own homeservers, if they want to. Plus, P2P is going to be part of the protocol at some point with embedded servers in the clients. So what's the monetisation strategy? I wish they were more upfront about that, even if the answer was "we have no idea yet". And if the plan is not to monetise, an answer as to how a centralised server with high demand will keep up with capacity would be appreciated.

husamia 5y ago

please turn off the captcha

jeffo_rulez 5y ago

chrome is blocking password resets due to a CORS issue.

pippy 5y ago

The verify email process has a link to go to your email provider. that's slick.

thih9 5y ago

Discord flagged my account with my main email immediately after registration. Temp email works fine. Support replies with unhelpful canned responses and contacting them didn’t solve my problem. All this is one more reason why an open source alternative is needed and why this is good news.

tirrex 5y ago

How are they going to make money and support the development?

skocznymroczny 5y ago

Aren't you worried about name similarity to Revolut? Or old RC car game Re-volt?

spurgu 5y ago

Nice touch with the "Open [My email provider]" button/link (to confirm your email) after signing up! Haven't seen that anywhere before.