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Speaking as project lead for Matrix, I agree that Matrix clients tend not to be as polished as Discord - we are not blind to usability problems. However, it’s

Speaking as project lead for Matrix, I agree that Matrix clients tend not to be as polished as Discord - we are not blind to usability problems. However, it’s not that clearcut - for instance, Element has a full product design team (albeit focused on making sure Element works for paying government customers rather than FOSS developer communities, currently). Does https://element.io/labs/element-x https://element.io/labs/element-x look like something from people who don’t care about usability? So I am not convinced that blanket statements like “FOSS alternatives have awful usability” (N times over in the same thread) are helpful. They are often grounded in groupthink or completely outdated info - “my friend Alice tried Matrix in 2019 and it sucked”, or “all my friends say Matrix sucks so I’m going to copy them”. Meanwhile, communities like Mozilla, FOSDEM, KDE, GNOME, Nix, Debian, Ubuntu etc all seem to manage to use Matrix successfully in practice. Some even like it. I suspect the bigger issue here are folks who refuse to use a system which doesn’t have total parity with every feature Discord has”, or who are annoyed at having to run more than one chat app; Discord is where my friends are. Alternatively, can someone actually articulate the showstopping usability issues which are being referred to here (say, when using Element Web)? Weirdly enough we would like to fix them, as fun as it is reading the “Matrix has bad usability and they can’t even see it themselves” trope.

esdf 3y ago
Here's some of my pet-peeves and experiences from the webapp, the webapp wrapping desktop app, and the iPhone app. Maybe they'll qualify for awful usability, maybe they won't. There's been an issue open for Push-to-talk in element for 6 years. Insane. The voice and video calls/conferences aren't very good interface-wise. You could defer to this Jitsi being bad though. Screen-sharing is just broken so your alternative is to use OBS and its Virtual Camera, which means audio-sharing doesn't work. You won't actually see the video until you find the quality option somewhere to slide it all the way up. The whole screen-sharing or conference thing remaining visible, after everyone has disconnected, until the "starter" closes it? I'm not sure. Element X is mobile only (correct me if I'm wrong) so it's irrelevant to many users. You can't reorder your "favourites", only sort by Activity or A-Z (and showing recent first). "Favourites" being non-American English was something I noticed right now which doesn't matter but is worth noting for i18n. The lines after a `>quote` also get swallowed up into a quote block which I'm not a fan of and requires you to have an empty line after. Github does something similar afair. The inexplicable Unable to decrypt messages that happen sometimes. Can likely be deferred as user-error. Trying to sync or transfer keys across devices and not knowing if it worked so you just sit there and wait to see if the Unable to decrypt messages resolve. >"Use the Desktop app to search encrypted messages" (from the webapp) And finally, one of the most annoying things: shit scrollback for messages. It loves to jump to the very bottom/latest messages. >folks who refuse to use a system which doesn’t have total parity with every feature Discord has”, or who are annoyed at having to run more than one chat app; Discord is where my friends are. Well, they are on Discord. And Discord has PTT(LOL!!!) and working screen-sharing (very important!). And Element has a bunch of these random things that make it annoying to use in comparison that makes everyone call it shit and then only use it for text chat and maybe Mumble for voice, when not using Discord of course. One more bug: some combination of right-clicking on the Element tray icon causes it to be covered by Windows' task-bar right-click menu.
AAAAaccountAAAA 3y ago
> Speaking as project lead for Matrix, I agree that Matrix clients tend not to be as polished as Discord - we are not blind to usability problems. User interface issues are the least of the probelms of Matrix. Much bigger obstacle to its adoption are the performance and reliability issues. While on some fronts there have been progress: joining a room does not take hours or days anymore. On the other hand, some other problems - like Matrix's tendency to drop messages - have actually gotten worse in my experience. No matter of polishing of the UI would help Matrix enough. You still need a solid technical foundation to build on. The "Sliding Sync" thing maybe could help, but being disappointed with Matrix once and once again, I don't have high exceptations. > However, it’s not that clearcut - for instance, Element has a full product design team (albeit focused on making sure Element works for paying government customers rather than FOSS developer communities, currently). Does https://element.io/labs/element-x https://element.io/labs/element-x look like something from people who don’t care about usability? Users don't care how much you spend money on it, they only care about results. > So I am not convinced that blanket statements like “FOSS alternatives have awful usability” (N times over in the same thread) are helpful. They are often grounded in groupthink or completely outdated info - “my friend Alice tried Matrix in 2019 and it sucked”, or “all my friends say Matrix sucks so I’m going to copy them”. And other times they are grounded on recent first-hand experience. > Meanwhile, communities like Mozilla, FOSDEM, KDE, GNOME, Nix, Debian, Ubuntu etc all seem to manage to use Matrix successfully in practice. Some even like it. Debian seems to be mostly still in IRC: https://wiki.debian.org/IRC https://wiki.debian.org/IRC Same goes for Ubuntu. It is only "in the initial testing phases" for Matrix. https://ubuntu.com/community/communications/matrix https://ubuntu.com/community/communications/matrix FOSDEM is a some sort of geek social club that doesn't really do anything. Beyond FOSDEM, only Mozilla, KDE, Gnome and Nix are actually imposing Matrix on their respective communities. However, none of these are really success stories. Mozilla's downward spiral in market share has been particularly spectacular. Desktop Linux's market share on the other hand has slowly increased, but it still clearly a niche product. > I suspect the bigger issue here are folks who refuse to use a system which doesn’t have total parity with every feature Discord has”, or who are annoyed at having to run more than one chat app; Discord is where my friends are. More important than feature parity is reliability. > Alternatively, can someone actually articulate the showstopping usability issues which are being referred to here (say, when using Element Web)? Weirdly enough we would like to fix them, as fun as it is reading the “Matrix has bad usability and they can’t even see it themselves” trope. Curious. Previously you have admitted to ignoring problems in order to spite users you don't like: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38351006 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38351006 While I can believe the user in question can be, umm, a somewhat difficult person, self-sabotage is hardly good for anything. If you have changed your mind, surley you can take a look at your bug tracker in order to find bug reports that need to be worked on. My response may come up as confrontative. I really would like Matrix to be good, but so far it has been really disappointing, and the project's reactions to criticism have been historically outright hostile. While I am pleased of the recent change for better what it comes to Matrix project's communication style, I am afraid it is too little, too late.
TulliusCicero 3y ago
> Does https://element.io/labs/element-x https://element.io/labs/element-x look like something from people who don’t care about usability? The "get started" page wants me to fill out a big ass form and is talking about deployments, so yeah? They don't seem to give a shit really. Edit: just tried downloading the Android app and the onboarding process is already deeply stupid. There is literally no "sign up" or "create account" option to even get started in it. How is a new user supposed to even move forward?! I don't think this is making the case you think it is. If this what a professional UX team came up with, I don't know whether to laugh or to cry. They failed at the most basic initial thing. I'm just a mobile app dev, not a UI designer proper, and I could still figure this part out. "There should be a way to sign up" is not advanced UX design.

esdf 3y ago

Here's some of my pet-peeves and experiences from the webapp, the webapp wrapping desktop app, and the iPhone app. Maybe they'll qualify for awful usability, maybe they won't. There's been an issue open for Push-to-talk in element for 6 years. Insane. The voice and video calls/conferences aren't very good interface-wise. You could defer to this Jitsi being bad though. Screen-sharing is just broken so your alternative is to use OBS and its Virtual Camera, which means audio-sharing doesn't work. You won't actually see the video until you find the quality option somewhere to slide it all the way up. The whole screen-sharing or conference thing remaining visible, after everyone has disconnected, until the "starter" closes it? I'm not sure. Element X is mobile only (correct me if I'm wrong) so it's irrelevant to many users. You can't reorder your "favourites", only sort by Activity or A-Z (and showing recent first). "Favourites" being non-American English was something I noticed right now which doesn't matter but is worth noting for i18n. The lines after a `>quote` also get swallowed up into a quote block which I'm not a fan of and requires you to have an empty line after. Github does something similar afair. The inexplicable Unable to decrypt messages that happen sometimes. Can likely be deferred as user-error. Trying to sync or transfer keys across devices and not knowing if it worked so you just sit there and wait to see if the Unable to decrypt messages resolve. >"Use the Desktop app to search encrypted messages" (from the webapp) And finally, one of the most annoying things: shit scrollback for messages. It loves to jump to the very bottom/latest messages. >folks who refuse to use a system which doesn’t have total parity with every feature Discord has”, or who are annoyed at having to run more than one chat app; Discord is where my friends are. Well, they are on Discord. And Discord has PTT(LOL!!!) and working screen-sharing (very important!). And Element has a bunch of these random things that make it annoying to use in comparison that makes everyone call it shit and then only use it for text chat and maybe Mumble for voice, when not using Discord of course. One more bug: some combination of right-clicking on the Element tray icon causes it to be covered by Windows' task-bar right-click menu.

AAAAaccountAAAA 3y ago

> Speaking as project lead for Matrix, I agree that Matrix clients tend not to be as polished as Discord - we are not blind to usability problems. User interface issues are the least of the probelms of Matrix. Much bigger obstacle to its adoption are the performance and reliability issues. While on some fronts there have been progress: joining a room does not take hours or days anymore. On the other hand, some other problems - like Matrix's tendency to drop messages - have actually gotten worse in my experience. No matter of polishing of the UI would help Matrix enough. You still need a solid technical foundation to build on. The "Sliding Sync" thing maybe could help, but being disappointed with Matrix once and once again, I don't have high exceptations. > However, it’s not that clearcut - for instance, Element has a full product design team (albeit focused on making sure Element works for paying government customers rather than FOSS developer communities, currently). Does https://element.io/labs/element-x https://element.io/labs/element-x look like something from people who don’t care about usability? Users don't care how much you spend money on it, they only care about results. > So I am not convinced that blanket statements like “FOSS alternatives have awful usability” (N times over in the same thread) are helpful. They are often grounded in groupthink or completely outdated info - “my friend Alice tried Matrix in 2019 and it sucked”, or “all my friends say Matrix sucks so I’m going to copy them”. And other times they are grounded on recent first-hand experience. > Meanwhile, communities like Mozilla, FOSDEM, KDE, GNOME, Nix, Debian, Ubuntu etc all seem to manage to use Matrix successfully in practice. Some even like it. Debian seems to be mostly still in IRC: https://wiki.debian.org/IRC https://wiki.debian.org/IRC Same goes for Ubuntu. It is only "in the initial testing phases" for Matrix. https://ubuntu.com/community/communications/matrix https://ubuntu.com/community/communications/matrix FOSDEM is a some sort of geek social club that doesn't really do anything. Beyond FOSDEM, only Mozilla, KDE, Gnome and Nix are actually imposing Matrix on their respective communities. However, none of these are really success stories. Mozilla's downward spiral in market share has been particularly spectacular. Desktop Linux's market share on the other hand has slowly increased, but it still clearly a niche product. > I suspect the bigger issue here are folks who refuse to use a system which doesn’t have total parity with every feature Discord has”, or who are annoyed at having to run more than one chat app; Discord is where my friends are. More important than feature parity is reliability. > Alternatively, can someone actually articulate the showstopping usability issues which are being referred to here (say, when using Element Web)? Weirdly enough we would like to fix them, as fun as it is reading the “Matrix has bad usability and they can’t even see it themselves” trope. Curious. Previously you have admitted to ignoring problems in order to spite users you don't like: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38351006 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38351006 While I can believe the user in question can be, umm, a somewhat difficult person, self-sabotage is hardly good for anything. If you have changed your mind, surley you can take a look at your bug tracker in order to find bug reports that need to be worked on. My response may come up as confrontative. I really would like Matrix to be good, but so far it has been really disappointing, and the project's reactions to criticism have been historically outright hostile. While I am pleased of the recent change for better what it comes to Matrix project's communication style, I am afraid it is too little, too late.

TulliusCicero 3y ago

> Does https://element.io/labs/element-x https://element.io/labs/element-x look like something from people who don’t care about usability? The "get started" page wants me to fill out a big ass form and is talking about deployments, so yeah? They don't seem to give a shit really. Edit: just tried downloading the Android app and the onboarding process is already deeply stupid. There is literally no "sign up" or "create account" option to even get started in it. How is a new user supposed to even move forward?! I don't think this is making the case you think it is. If this what a professional UX team came up with, I don't know whether to laugh or to cry. They failed at the most basic initial thing. I'm just a mobile app dev, not a UI designer proper, and I could still figure this part out. "There should be a way to sign up" is not advanced UX design.