4 ms·

No mention of XMPP so I'll be that guy. XMPP has a variety of clients for about all platforms, is federated, can (optionally) be e2ee. Its most used client on

by nicoco 4y ago

No mention of XMPP so I'll be that guy. XMPP has a variety of clients for about all platforms, is federated, can (optionally) be e2ee. Its most used client on Android is user-friendly and has built-in (optional, again) tor support. On a cheap vps you can easily run a server with many users. I think it deserves a little more love than it receives.

Semaphor 4y ago
I love XMPP/Jabber and the available clients are vastly superior to what Matrix and Signal offer. Sadly, the amount of people I know who use it make Matrix shine in comparison :(
- fsflover 4y ago
  > and the available clients are vastly superior to what Matrix and Signal offer Care to elaborate?
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    Signal has a bulky, slow Windows client. Elements is a [0] bulky, slow Windows client. Gajim is fast (I’m guessing it’s the only native of the 3, but I haven’t checked). Configurability is also better. And then there are other options (which I’ll evaluate soon, as I did not like the recent redesign), while there are none for Signal and none that are stable for Matrix. It’s not as bad on mobile (I can only talk about Signal here, not Matrix), as clients are far more constrained, but once again Signal has a slow Android client (every action only happens after a noticeable delay) while the biggest XMPP client Conversations is instant. [0]: I tried a beta version that felt like an alpha, but OTOH the last time I tried it, it seemed reasonably stable.
heywoodlh 4y ago
Thanks for being that guy, this gets me thinking about setting up an XMPP server and integrating stuff into it. Random tangent: I feel like XMPP is everywhere but nobody really talks about it. It just quietly works and stays out of the way.
zaik 4y ago
XMPP needs more love. Provider indepedent end-to-end encrypted messaging, standardized by the IETF and not tied to a VC-funded startup reinventing the wheel. Let's make using and building on internet standards popular again.
grumbel 4y ago
Are there any Linux client with good spam filtering? I had to give up on XMPP as I was receiving thousands of times the amount of spam as I did actual messages. Just rendered the whole thing completely unusable.
- nicoco 4y ago
  I think you can block a user easily if your server supports XEP-0191, or if it implements some sort of blacklisting. I am unsure about blocking client side, since I never needed it (yet?). It is probably due to XMPP's lack of popularity, but FWIW I have been using my XMPP for about 4 years and have not received a single unsolicited message yet.
prashantsengar 4y ago
Genuinely curious: so why is XMPP not so popular outside of the hacker community?
- nicoco 4y ago
  I think that beside the scary name, not forcing 'apps' into user's devices and via massive advertising is what makes XMPP not so popular. https://snikket.org/ https://snikket.org/ is an attempt to 'rebrand' XMPP into something that should be more familiar to non-hackers.
- nl 4y ago
  Because critical features that users need aren't there. Eg: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32248514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32248514
  - zaik 4y ago
    I never got any spam on my XMPP address, probably because I treat it like my phone number and only use it for chatting with friends and family.
    - nl 4y ago
      Yes, which sort of explains why it has failed for widespread adoption. The wider audience wants to be able to hand out their contact details at a bar and know they'll be able to block the person if they turn out to be a creep. Or they want to be able to block their annoying ex, that crazy QAnon fan cousin etc etc. This is a 100% must have feature, and yet it's treated like an optional feature. There's so many features like this - it's like people using XMPP have never looked at how most people use messaging.
      - nicoco 4y ago
        You can easily block any XMPP address you want. Why are you spreading FUD like this?
tao_oat 4y ago
The promise of XMPP + E2EE (with OMEMO) is appealing, but I found that in practice it doesn't work. For example: you want to start an E2EE chat with your friend on the riseup.net XMPP server. You can't, because their server hasn't enabled the necessary XEPs like Message Archive Management. I think XMPP is perhaps the best example of what Moxie was talking about in The Ecosystem is Moving: it's a super fragmented experience. Most users do not (and should not need to) know the technical details of how their server, or their friend's servers, are configured.
- nicoco 4y ago
  > I found that in practice it doesn't work May I suggest you give it another try? It has been steadily working for me for a few years now. (Conversations/gajim/dino/siskin-im/beagle for the clients, and prosody server side) > because their server hasn't enabled the necessary XEPs Changing to a server that does is not a big deal, since most (all?) XMPP clients allow multiaccounting. > it's a super fragmented experience What you call fragmentation I would call diversity, and I think it is a good thing. > Most users do not (and should not need to) know the technical details I agree that a certain level of abstraction is necessary to use complicated stuff. However, I think not having the slightest idea of things work is a problem, and leads to alienation.
- NoGravitas 4y ago
  I like the speed and simplicity of XMPP with OMEMO, but you're right that apps and servers may not all be up to date. IMO, if a server doesn't support the latest IM and Mobile compliance suites[1], the admin responsible is negligent, though. You should just be able to install Conversations and have an encrypted chat with anyone (I recognize that this is not, in practice, the case). For me, the biggest blocker on XMPP is that OMEMO and multiple devices don't seem to get along. Matrix solves this with cross-signing, but I don't believe the OMEMO XEP addresses the problem in any way. I think Moxie's article is directly a response to XMPP. But on the other hand, Matrix has managed to have both federation and rapid evolution, so he's just empirically wrong. [1]: https://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0459.html https://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0459.html
  - 4y ago

by nicoco 4y ago

Semaphor 4y ago

I love XMPP/Jabber and the available clients are vastly superior to what Matrix and Signal offer. Sadly, the amount of people I know who use it make Matrix shine in comparison :(

fsflover 4y ago
> and the available clients are vastly superior to what Matrix and Signal offer Care to elaborate?
- Semaphor 4y ago
  Signal has a bulky, slow Windows client. Elements is a [0] bulky, slow Windows client. Gajim is fast (I’m guessing it’s the only native of the 3, but I haven’t checked). Configurability is also better. And then there are other options (which I’ll evaluate soon, as I did not like the recent redesign), while there are none for Signal and none that are stable for Matrix. It’s not as bad on mobile (I can only talk about Signal here, not Matrix), as clients are far more constrained, but once again Signal has a slow Android client (every action only happens after a noticeable delay) while the biggest XMPP client Conversations is instant. [0]: I tried a beta version that felt like an alpha, but OTOH the last time I tried it, it seemed reasonably stable.

heywoodlh 4y ago

Thanks for being that guy, this gets me thinking about setting up an XMPP server and integrating stuff into it. Random tangent: I feel like XMPP is everywhere but nobody really talks about it. It just quietly works and stays out of the way.

zaik 4y ago

XMPP needs more love. Provider indepedent end-to-end encrypted messaging, standardized by the IETF and not tied to a VC-funded startup reinventing the wheel. Let's make using and building on internet standards popular again.

grumbel 4y ago

Are there any Linux client with good spam filtering? I had to give up on XMPP as I was receiving thousands of times the amount of spam as I did actual messages. Just rendered the whole thing completely unusable.

nicoco 4y ago
I think you can block a user easily if your server supports XEP-0191, or if it implements some sort of blacklisting. I am unsure about blocking client side, since I never needed it (yet?). It is probably due to XMPP's lack of popularity, but FWIW I have been using my XMPP for about 4 years and have not received a single unsolicited message yet.

prashantsengar 4y ago

Genuinely curious: so why is XMPP not so popular outside of the hacker community?

nicoco 4y ago
I think that beside the scary name, not forcing 'apps' into user's devices and via massive advertising is what makes XMPP not so popular. https://snikket.org/ https://snikket.org/ is an attempt to 'rebrand' XMPP into something that should be more familiar to non-hackers.
nl 4y ago
Because critical features that users need aren't there. Eg: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32248514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32248514
- zaik 4y ago
  I never got any spam on my XMPP address, probably because I treat it like my phone number and only use it for chatting with friends and family.
  - nl 4y ago
    Yes, which sort of explains why it has failed for widespread adoption. The wider audience wants to be able to hand out their contact details at a bar and know they'll be able to block the person if they turn out to be a creep. Or they want to be able to block their annoying ex, that crazy QAnon fan cousin etc etc. This is a 100% must have feature, and yet it's treated like an optional feature. There's so many features like this - it's like people using XMPP have never looked at how most people use messaging.
    - nicoco 4y ago
      You can easily block any XMPP address you want. Why are you spreading FUD like this?

tao_oat 4y ago

The promise of XMPP + E2EE (with OMEMO) is appealing, but I found that in practice it doesn't work. For example: you want to start an E2EE chat with your friend on the riseup.net XMPP server. You can't, because their server hasn't enabled the necessary XEPs like Message Archive Management. I think XMPP is perhaps the best example of what Moxie was talking about in The Ecosystem is Moving: it's a super fragmented experience. Most users do not (and should not need to) know the technical details of how their server, or their friend's servers, are configured.

nicoco 4y ago
> I found that in practice it doesn't work May I suggest you give it another try? It has been steadily working for me for a few years now. (Conversations/gajim/dino/siskin-im/beagle for the clients, and prosody server side) > because their server hasn't enabled the necessary XEPs Changing to a server that does is not a big deal, since most (all?) XMPP clients allow multiaccounting. > it's a super fragmented experience What you call fragmentation I would call diversity, and I think it is a good thing. > Most users do not (and should not need to) know the technical details I agree that a certain level of abstraction is necessary to use complicated stuff. However, I think not having the slightest idea of things work is a problem, and leads to alienation.
NoGravitas 4y ago
I like the speed and simplicity of XMPP with OMEMO, but you're right that apps and servers may not all be up to date. IMO, if a server doesn't support the latest IM and Mobile compliance suites[1], the admin responsible is negligent, though. You should just be able to install Conversations and have an encrypted chat with anyone (I recognize that this is not, in practice, the case). For me, the biggest blocker on XMPP is that OMEMO and multiple devices don't seem to get along. Matrix solves this with cross-signing, but I don't believe the OMEMO XEP addresses the problem in any way. I think Moxie's article is directly a response to XMPP. But on the other hand, Matrix has managed to have both federation and rapid evolution, so he's just empirically wrong. [1]: https://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0459.html https://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0459.html
- 4y ago