Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
matrix.org
Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
1–10 of 97 posts
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#2I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat.
There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, and people signing up to and using the network with Riot.
Key management and verification needs the most work in Riot (even the redesigned client), especially for secure channels. That’s the biggest point of friction for me and my friends so far.
I’m very much looking forward to what Matrix can do as a network, and what both rich clients like Riot, combined with esoteric clients that do strange and wonderful things, can enable.
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#3I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat. There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, an…
Yes Riot really needs a way to swap keys using NFC, so you only have to tap phones together when you meet. We actually did get an encrypted chatroom going at the last KVM Forum in Edinburgh, but it was insanely tedious to do all the key verification.
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#4I was at Matthew's talk. Great energy and highly informative talk.
I really wish though that instead of rewriting Synapse in Python 3 that they would adopt Status' new favourite language: Nim :)
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#5I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat. There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, an…
Yes Riot really needs a way to swap keys using NFC, so you only have to tap phones together when you meet. We actually did get an encrypted chatroom going at the last KVM Forum in Edinburgh, but it was insanely tedious to do all the key verification.
so, in riot.im/develop we now do verification by Short Authentication Strings (similar to ZRTP: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/issues/1267) and have QR codes on the horizon too (https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/pull/1544).
Meanwhile we also have cross-signing on the horizon, as demo'd in the OP: (https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/pull/1756) so you only have to verify a user once and then transitively trust all their other devices automatically (assuming that user verified them when they logged in).
This was a massive amount of work, but tantalising close.
https://youtu.be/C2eE7rCUKlE?t=2836 is the bit of the talk from FOSDEM which shows this being demo'd and (almost) working :)
Edit: NFC would be cute, but it's not ideal from an evil maid perspective, and you'd have to tap to confirm that you verified the right user ID anyway. So personally QR codes ftw.
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#6I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat. There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, an…
Do you have an idea how this compares to Keybase.io and their team based chat?
What's the main difference with matrix? Is Keybase something you were aware of and decided against for some reason?
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#7I was at Matthew's talk. Great energy and highly informative talk. I really wish though that instead of rewriting Synapse in Python 3 that they would adopt Status' new favourite language: Nim :)
the Synapse port to Python 3 is complete :D However, the next-gen one we're working on (https://github.com/matrix-org/dendrite) is in Go. Nim rocks though, and it'd be wonderful for someone to write a Nim homeserver (especially as we finally have a stable release of the server-server API at last!!)
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#8I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat. There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, an…
Do you have an idea how this compares to Keybase.io and their team based chat? What's the main difference with matrix? Is Keybase something you were aware of and decided against for some reason?
Matrix is an open standard protocol (https://matrix.org/docs/spec) and an open network like the Web, but for realtime comms. Anyone can spin up a server and start participating in the network, and in Matrix the conversations are replicated over all the servers whose users participate in that conversation, so there is no single point of failure or control: the conversations are owned by the users. All the implementations we release as matrix.org are Apache licensed FOSS.
Now, Keybase is cool - particularly how it's effectively a key management system which drives a collaboration tool. We hoped originally they would provide it as a decentralised identity management system that we could hook into Matrix to replace our identity service. But in practice it seems to be centralised, and whilst the client is FOSS (https://github.com/keybase/client) the server isn't. So, it's more an E2EE-capable centralised collaboration tool built on a cool key management system. I believe their E2EE is based on shared keys rather than a cryptographic ratchet (Matrix uses inspired-by-Signal Double Ratchet with extensions), which is a simpler approach, but doesn't give you the option of PFS. I'm also not sure if their crypto has been audited (whereas we have a slightly ageing audit of Matrix's implementation over at https://matrix.org/blog/2016/11/21/matrixs-olm-end-to-end-en...).
[disclaimer: I'm project lead of Matrix and the author of the OP]
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#9I’ve learned about, installed, and configured both Synapse (official Python server implementation) and riot-web (browser version of Riot, the official client) recently, to give me and some friends a post-IRC means of modern, secured chat. There are some wrinkles, but in the main I think the project is making significant progress on making the whole thing work well for both admins of the hosted server and riot-web, an…
Do you have an idea how this compares to Keybase.io and their team based chat? What's the main difference with matrix? Is Keybase something you were aware of and decided against for some reason?
AFAIK Keybase is centralized while Matrix is federated, so you can set up and run your own Matrix server without worry of a central point of failure (or surveillance).
Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019
#10I was at Matthew's talk. Great energy and highly informative talk. I really wish though that instead of rewriting Synapse in Python 3 that they would adopt Status' new favourite language: Nim :)
Was also at the talk. The room was packed!