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Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

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Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#181
post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bloated, take too much RAM and don't use the OS features that I paid for.

Unfortunately, the cross platform UI alternatives are all terrible.

I don't consider Qt, wxWidgets, Swing, JavaFX, FireMonkey, terrible.

For me it looks like web devs that don't want to learn native APIs.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#182
post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're interested in learning how to implement end-to-end chats with multiple devices, checkout out Wire security whitepaper ( https://wire.com/resource/Wire%20Security%20Whitepaper/downl... ) for one way of doing it. Hopefully, OpenWhisperSystems will release documentation about their implementation in Signal (note: it doesn't require phone, unlike WhatsApp)

Thanks! Will definitely read this. I got fooled by Signal's requirement of a phone for the activation and thought it was also required for normal usage, I guess that's better than Whatsapp, though being able to register and use it without a phone at all would be even better (even Telegram doesn't do this though, IIRC it requires a phone number)

Agreed on phone numbers. Speaking of Wire, it doesn't require them.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#183
post #6

PSA: Telegram is dangerous snake oil—bad crypto. Don't use it, don't let friends use it. https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/81899003583181619... https://twitter.com/kaepora/status/819181464369577984 https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/81919238137120358...

I keep seeing this as a reason not to use Telegram, but here is what I want to know:

As a user who doesn't care about my chats being 100% encrypted, but does want the convenience of multi-platform messaging, is Telegram a better alternative to Facebook Messenger, Google Hangouts or Whatsapp? My messages on Telegram may not be encrypted, but are they actively used to siphon information from my messages to contribute to my non-anonymized (or poorly anonymized) advertiser profile, and freely passed or sold to third-parties as they are with those platforms?

I've only seen hardline stances on "If you don't care about privacy, Telegram is great!" or "If you care about privacy, Telegram is awful garbage". What about the grey area in the middle? Where does it fit?

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#184
post #126
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get it. Why is native better than browser application? Browser application is by definition better sandboxed and can do much less damage to the system. Normal application can do mayhem. And Telegram needs root access for installation... do I want to give it root access? When I can just open another tab?

And i don't get it, why kids today want only a browser. All that flame wars about the best window manager we fought and now we end up with one window only and a fucking tab bar?

Don't worry, they will invent tiling window managers inside a browser tab next.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#185
post #159
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IRC: kind of, you can have a bot that joins a Telegram group and the IRC channel and forwards messages. It's getting more and more common. Other than bots, the client is really a Telegram client, not something like Pidgin. Personally I don't mind, since everyone's on Telegram. I actually prefer to have a client that's excellent with one network rather than a client that does quite well with many networks. Having used…

> Personally I don't mind, since everyone's on Telegram. I don't know a single person who is on Telegram. My friends have not even heard of it despite the fact that they all talk online and a good percentage of them are developers. Why would I start using it if no one I know uses it?

Because that's how it gets started.

Bad example: I knew nobody on Google+ but I made some new friends. The network died again, or at least I stopped using it after a year and a half or something, so it's a bad example in that it didn't work out in the end, but yeah that's how things get started. Why do you think the first million people got Whatsapp? If you don't try something new and convince at least one other person to use it, how would things ever change?

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#186
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think plenty of people care about privacy, which is probably why they don't want to use Facebook's acquired messenger product but rather use something independent and open source.

Facebook's acquired messenger product uses Signal Protocol for end-to-end encryption. From a security perspective, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are materially, categorically more secure than Telegram.

Hi, we've had this discussion before. You say the crypto is better, which is true, I say it's unverifiable and it has a company behind it with a bad track record for privacy, which is also true. Still we can't agree on which one to use.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#187
post #158
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> PSA: Telegram is dangerous snake oil 1. They don't claim to do end to end crypto unless you use the secret chats 2. The secret chats still aren't broken. Since 2013, I'd think at least one "crypto expert" (which all said a custom protocol was a bad idea) would have taken the effort to prove it by now. 3. Whatsapp claims to have better encryption, and they probably do, but it's 1) a lot less convenient and 2) unveri…

if you dont like whatsapp you can use Signal. it's the open source software that was integrated into whatsapp and is the basis of it's e2e encryption. both are better options than telegram.

> if you dont like whatsapp you can use Signal

Yeah that doesn't work at all on my phone because it requires me to use Google Cloud Messaging (Google stuff on my phone is firewalled). You can't just connect to the Signal servers -- or your own for that matter -- and be done with it, you need to use Google servers.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used VIM on my Amiga. Today I am mostly using VS Code on my 8 year old Dell at work. For coding there is no performance issues. My Point: VS Code is a great electron application. Works great.

It is but it's slower than Vim. I've tried it. It is fast, for Electron app. Try opening huge text or log file in it.

> It is but it's slower than Vim.

VS Code I don't get the text editor speed as an issue ever. I used Vim (I use Vim mode in all my editors) not because it was faster on the CPU it was because it made my work faster. Today VS Code makes me work fast. I seriously have a 8 year old Dell crappy corporate computer for work and there is no noticeable slow down on either RStudio or VS Code.

Re: Telegram Desktop reaches version 1.0

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The encryption is often cited as its primary selling point here, but I don't think that's too representative. Certainly it isn't for me and most other Telegram users I know. I don't care much about that as I don't really trust any messaging app enough to send really confidential information through them. For me, for example, he selling point is having an interface as slick as Whatsapp's, but not being tied to the pho…

Telegram most certainly required me to enter mobile phone number. (Wouldn't even take a landline!)

Sorry, I didn't express myself too clearly. I meant that you can add contacts without giving them your phone number. You do have to give Telegram your number.
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