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It's depressing to see and hear that New Vector is rewriting the flagship client about every 5 years or so, with each rewrite taking multiple years. Each time t

It's depressing to see and hear that New Vector is rewriting the flagship client about every 5 years or so, with each rewrite taking multiple years. Each time the new client is hailed as the saviour, and then after a while, denounced as obsolete. Soon again, the new saviour is right around the corner. That is not the way you create high-quality software in a cost-efficient manner. While Matrix has a value as the pretty much only open-standard IM system with even moderate levels of user adoption, all this makes it hard to actually love it or even to be enthustiastic about it.

Arathorn 1y ago
The only problem with this statement is that it’s untrue. Element Web/Desktop is 11 years old and has never been rewritten, and while we’re just starting to experiment with the Rust SDK for it, it’s unclear yet whether we migrate the current app to Rust SDK or write an Element X Web. Element iOS is also 11 years old, and as fun and expensive as it was maintaining three entirely separate codebases between iOS/Android/Web, we only switched to Rust with Element X as of Sept, and have no plans to switch again. Now, it’s true that Riot Android did get rewritten in ~2019 (into RiotX, which became Element Android) - mainly because it needed to get a proper storage layer and to move from Android 2.x vintage UI code. Now we have a common rust SDK to do all the heavy lifting it is reasonable to switch the app to use it, which is what Element X Android is. In other words, this whole exercise is trying to simplify development on to one stable Rust codebase, rather than hunting bugs and reimplementing features over 3 entirely separate codebases. If we did it again perhaps we’d try for a replace-the-engine like Signal did rather than rewrite-the-app - or perhaps do a big bang replacement when the rewrite is ready. But instead we wanted to get the new apps in the hands of users earlier, and we do not remotely have the funding to develop both old and new in parallel. Hopefully history will show this was an okay approach in the end, even if everyone hates us in the final stages of the transition.

Arathorn 1y ago

The only problem with this statement is that it’s untrue. Element Web/Desktop is 11 years old and has never been rewritten, and while we’re just starting to experiment with the Rust SDK for it, it’s unclear yet whether we migrate the current app to Rust SDK or write an Element X Web. Element iOS is also 11 years old, and as fun and expensive as it was maintaining three entirely separate codebases between iOS/Android/Web, we only switched to Rust with Element X as of Sept, and have no plans to switch again. Now, it’s true that Riot Android did get rewritten in ~2019 (into RiotX, which became Element Android) - mainly because it needed to get a proper storage layer and to move from Android 2.x vintage UI code. Now we have a common rust SDK to do all the heavy lifting it is reasonable to switch the app to use it, which is what Element X Android is. In other words, this whole exercise is trying to simplify development on to one stable Rust codebase, rather than hunting bugs and reimplementing features over 3 entirely separate codebases. If we did it again perhaps we’d try for a replace-the-engine like Signal did rather than rewrite-the-app - or perhaps do a big bang replacement when the rewrite is ready. But instead we wanted to get the new apps in the hands of users earlier, and we do not remotely have the funding to develop both old and new in parallel. Hopefully history will show this was an okay approach in the end, even if everyone hates us in the final stages of the transition.