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Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

matrix.org

31–40 of 97 posts

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#31
post #30

There is a bright future where individual users can trivially (like one click deployment trivial) spin up a Mastodon and Matrix container and have their own social network and IM server running in minutes that federates with all the others in a giant decentralized web. Again. I'll keep pressuring everyone I know to migrate to federated replacements for monolithic proprietary alternatives.

What are you using for "one click deployment" of Mastodon and Matrix?

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#32
So I see a lot of conversation about how matrix is a IRC replacement. But I think, it could be a powerful Slack replacement as well. A federated chat self-hosted infrastructure could theoretically be more scalable than a centralised product.

But I think the product will need to be radically better to go down this road. Not tech...but product. And yes I have evaluated the new experimental release very closely (we were about to purchase a 300 seat license for a Hipchat replacement).

Personally I think that the infrastructure can be simplified and corrected - I think that instead of a python based server with a react based reference client (riot), it would be simpler to have the reference server and client in Typescript. The packaging and development is simpler and you also get type safety (which would be very important for innovation at the cryptographic protocols level).

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#33

So I see a lot of conversation about how matrix is a IRC replacement. But I think, it could be a powerful Slack replacement as well. A federated chat self-hosted infrastructure could theoretically be more scalable than a centralised product. But I think the product will need to be radically better to go down this road. Not tech...but product. And yes I have evaluated the new experimental release very closely (we were…

How is moving everything to Typescript a "product" decision, that's like the worst technical decision possible (complete rewrite for very little benefit).

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#34

So I see a lot of conversation about how matrix is a IRC replacement. But I think, it could be a powerful Slack replacement as well. A federated chat self-hosted infrastructure could theoretically be more scalable than a centralised product. But I think the product will need to be radically better to go down this road. Not tech...but product. And yes I have evaluated the new experimental release very closely (we were…

How is moving everything to Typescript a "product" decision, that's like the worst technical decision possible (complete rewrite for very little benefit).

I didn't downvote you, but let me explain. The product improvement point was separate from this point and in all honesty is just my personal opinion.

I'm seeing a bunch of type safety bugs crop up periodically (e.g. https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/issues/3191 and https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/issues/4112). I think there is also Dendrite in golang which is a higher performance and typesafe server in golang. Personally i think since the reference client in react is unavoidable (and that's where the product innovation really happens), it is probably more efficient for the org to have everything in typescript and make life easy for engineers/contributors.

I have my startup founder hat on when I say this.

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#35
I have a Matrix homeserver running on an Odroid XU4 that sits under my TV. I also have bridge servers running for iMessage, Slack, and Hangouts (which includes Google Voice) that connect those services into Matrix.

Being able to see and respond to all my messages from all those services while I'm ssh'd into a weechat client is surreal and amazing. Going back to tapping out messages on my phone in iMessage or opening up the god-awful hangouts web client that shows my chat in a phone-sized window even on my 43 inch monitor feels like a joke at this point.

For now, that kind of setup isn't really accessible to a non-technical user, but even so it's the killer feature. Matrix has a few rough edges, but it genuinely feels like it's growing into something that is objectively better than all the other proprietary services out there.

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#36
post #35

I have a Matrix homeserver running on an Odroid XU4 that sits under my TV. I also have bridge servers running for iMessage, Slack, and Hangouts (which includes Google Voice) that connect those services into Matrix. Being able to see and respond to all my messages from all those services while I'm ssh'd into a weechat client is surreal and amazing. Going back to tapping out messages on my phone in iMessage or opening…

I have made a similar setup with IRC. I have set up bitlbee with Facebook, Telegram, Hangouts and Steam plugins, bitlbee is connected to quassel-core and I use native Quassel clients on all my platforms to connect to the core (trough VPN if needed).

The only rough edge I have with this setup is that I lose video playback in client compared to say Messenger or TG. Maybe one day...

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#37
post #35

I have a Matrix homeserver running on an Odroid XU4 that sits under my TV. I also have bridge servers running for iMessage, Slack, and Hangouts (which includes Google Voice) that connect those services into Matrix. Being able to see and respond to all my messages from all those services while I'm ssh'd into a weechat client is surreal and amazing. Going back to tapping out messages on my phone in iMessage or opening…

What bridges do you use for iMessage, slack, and Hangouts?

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#38
post #37
post #35

I have a Matrix homeserver running on an Odroid XU4 that sits under my TV. I also have bridge servers running for iMessage, Slack, and Hangouts (which includes Google Voice) that connect those services into Matrix. Being able to see and respond to all my messages from all those services while I'm ssh'd into a weechat client is surreal and amazing. Going back to tapping out messages on my phone in iMessage or opening…

What bridges do you use for iMessage, slack, and Hangouts?

All three are the puppet bridges from here: https://github.com/matrix-hacks. The Hangouts and Slack bridges run on the odroid, same as synapse, and iMessage runs on an old mac mini I bought off of ebay.

The docs could be better, but I didn't find them too terribly hard to set up. If you decide to try it out and need any help feel free to ask around in #matrix-puppet-bridge:matrix.org

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#39
post #35

I have a Matrix homeserver running on an Odroid XU4 that sits under my TV. I also have bridge servers running for iMessage, Slack, and Hangouts (which includes Google Voice) that connect those services into Matrix. Being able to see and respond to all my messages from all those services while I'm ssh'd into a weechat client is surreal and amazing. Going back to tapping out messages on my phone in iMessage or opening…

I have made a similar setup with IRC. I have set up bitlbee with Facebook, Telegram, Hangouts and Steam plugins, bitlbee is connected to quassel-core and I use native Quassel clients on all my platforms to connect to the core (trough VPN if needed). The only rough edge I have with this setup is that I lose video playback in client compared to say Messenger or TG. Maybe one day...

How well does the Steam integration work? I haven't tried setting up a bridge yet, but even on the web client I constantly get logged out.

Re: Matrix at FOSDEM 2019

#40

While I'm very excited about the prospects for Matrix in 2019, the reality of client choice for end-to-end encrypted Matrix chat is currently disappointing compared to the potential it has. Someone on reddit gathered some data [1] about E2EE support a few months ago, and Debian maintain a wiki page [2] about their progress packaging Matrix-implementing applications. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/privacy/comments/9avye…

I bear no ill-will towards the Matrix project, but this fact pattern (I knew about it in the abstract but hadn't seen it laid out like this) makes me actually angry about the people who have recommended Matrix as a replacement for the Signal Protocol messengers like Signal, WhatsApp, and Wire. Telling people to switch to Matrix from those is simply malpractice.
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