5 ms·

I'll shake my first and one day see people using open standards protocols rather than this morass of proprietary dribble. Until then, I'm marginally lonely on

by zanny 13y ago

I'll shake my first and one day see people using open standards protocols rather than this morass of proprietary dribble. Until then, I'm marginally lonely on my xmpp clients, though the facebook integration really helps.

Retric 13y ago
Proprietary messaging apps have a huge advantage in cutting down spam. Solve that and your open standard might just take off.
- nwh 13y ago
  That's just security through obscurity. Seems to work for iMessage though, I've heard it's obfuscation is something incredible.
  - napoleond 13y ago
    Spam prevention is not strictly a security problem, or if you choose to frame it that way it is entirely unlike most other system security challenges. Almost all spam prevention systems have some sort of secret sauce involved, otherwise spammers could train their own systems against it to discover what works. In other words, this is why most open-source security products are extremely competitive with (if not outright better than) their closed-source counterparts, but open-source spam prevention systems (with no disrespect to the people who work hard on them, because as I said, it's a hard problem) suck.
  - sliverstorm 13y ago
    Security through obscurity is not an invalid strategy. If the capabilities of your adversary are low (e.g., bottomfeeding spammers) and the obscurity changes often (e.g., churn in API) it can work just fine.
bsder 13y ago
The messaging part isn't the problem. The value in Skype, WhatsApp, etc. is the vast amount of work and codebase that goes into punching holes in routers/gateways/NATs to make the internet actually work like it was originally designed.
- kayoone 13y ago
  WhatsApp is not p2p, they maintain a constant server connection which is not a problem for routers/gateways/NATs because its initiated from the client side.
kashif 13y ago
Also XMPP is non-performant and verbose - these things matter as far a protocols go.
- fennecfoxen 13y ago
  More importantly, XMPP has problems delivering the text-message-like experience. It's more of a live-chat protocol. If you want to receive messages when you're offline, things rapidly become a mess.
  - ge0rg 13y ago
    fortunately there is improvement in sight: XEP-313 Message Archive Management [0] allows a client to fetch the backlog from its server, at the (privacy) cost of having all your messages stored on the server. [0] http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0313.html http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0313.html
  - zimpenfish 13y ago
    They shouldn't, though, because pretty much every XMPP server I've seen has user-offline message storage for later delivery eg [1], [2], and the "best practices" have been documented for years, e.g. [3]. Unless you actually mean "receive messages [to your device] when you're offline" and how the hell would that work? [1] https://prosody.im/doc/modules/mod_offline https://prosody.im/doc/modules/mod_offline [2] http://www.process-one.net/docs/ejabberd/guide_en.html#htoc48 http://www.process-one.net/docs/ejabberd/guide_en.html#htoc4... [3] http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0160.html http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0160.html
mahyarm 13y ago
XMPP was designed for desktops with persistent internet connections, it has issues with a non-modified implementation on mobile.
meowface 13y ago
WhatsApp is actually built on XMPP, I believe. I'm not sure how much it's modified it though.
nashrafeeq 13y ago
Whatsapp actually uses a modified XMPP server
AznHisoka 13y ago
Trillian! Seriously...ok, I get that these apps like WhatsApp, Viper got tons of users, but please don't give me no BS about them innovating. Trillian solved that problem a long long long long time ago.
- tracker1 13y ago
  I used to really like Trillian, iirc even payed for it once upon a time, but haven't used it in forever... most of my family and a lot of my friends are all on FB, so I check there once in a while.. anyone else will SMS/text me. If anything, I think I've used google hangouts than most of the other IM platforms lately.

by zanny 13y ago

Retric 13y ago

Proprietary messaging apps have a huge advantage in cutting down spam. Solve that and your open standard might just take off.

nwh 13y ago
That's just security through obscurity. Seems to work for iMessage though, I've heard it's obfuscation is something incredible.
- napoleond 13y ago
  Spam prevention is not strictly a security problem, or if you choose to frame it that way it is entirely unlike most other system security challenges. Almost all spam prevention systems have some sort of secret sauce involved, otherwise spammers could train their own systems against it to discover what works. In other words, this is why most open-source security products are extremely competitive with (if not outright better than) their closed-source counterparts, but open-source spam prevention systems (with no disrespect to the people who work hard on them, because as I said, it's a hard problem) suck.
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  Security through obscurity is not an invalid strategy. If the capabilities of your adversary are low (e.g., bottomfeeding spammers) and the obscurity changes often (e.g., churn in API) it can work just fine.

bsder 13y ago

The messaging part isn't the problem. The value in Skype, WhatsApp, etc. is the vast amount of work and codebase that goes into punching holes in routers/gateways/NATs to make the internet actually work like it was originally designed.

kayoone 13y ago
WhatsApp is not p2p, they maintain a constant server connection which is not a problem for routers/gateways/NATs because its initiated from the client side.

kashif 13y ago

Also XMPP is non-performant and verbose - these things matter as far a protocols go.

fennecfoxen 13y ago
More importantly, XMPP has problems delivering the text-message-like experience. It's more of a live-chat protocol. If you want to receive messages when you're offline, things rapidly become a mess.
- ge0rg 13y ago
  fortunately there is improvement in sight: XEP-313 Message Archive Management [0] allows a client to fetch the backlog from its server, at the (privacy) cost of having all your messages stored on the server. [0] http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0313.html http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0313.html
- zimpenfish 13y ago
  They shouldn't, though, because pretty much every XMPP server I've seen has user-offline message storage for later delivery eg [1], [2], and the "best practices" have been documented for years, e.g. [3]. Unless you actually mean "receive messages [to your device] when you're offline" and how the hell would that work? [1] https://prosody.im/doc/modules/mod_offline https://prosody.im/doc/modules/mod_offline [2] http://www.process-one.net/docs/ejabberd/guide_en.html#htoc48 http://www.process-one.net/docs/ejabberd/guide_en.html#htoc4... [3] http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0160.html http://xmpp.org/extensions/xep-0160.html

mahyarm 13y ago

XMPP was designed for desktops with persistent internet connections, it has issues with a non-modified implementation on mobile.

meowface 13y ago

WhatsApp is actually built on XMPP, I believe. I'm not sure how much it's modified it though.

nashrafeeq 13y ago

Whatsapp actually uses a modified XMPP server

AznHisoka 13y ago

Trillian! Seriously...ok, I get that these apps like WhatsApp, Viper got tons of users, but please don't give me no BS about them innovating. Trillian solved that problem a long long long long time ago.

tracker1 13y ago
I used to really like Trillian, iirc even payed for it once upon a time, but haven't used it in forever... most of my family and a lot of my friends are all on FB, so I check there once in a while.. anyone else will SMS/text me. If anything, I think I've used google hangouts than most of the other IM platforms lately.