Disappointing
Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
371–380 of 649 posts
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#372Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since there’s no server storing media, consider saving the stuff you want and dumping all the old photos and video you don’t. It’s a more secure communication tool, not an archive.
People usually want both and that's what causes most people to ignore good tools.
Signal is in a weird place where they can do no right by users. It's a team of like 25 developers building extremely complex software criticized by people that don't understand security and trivialize everything. Reddit has a lot of evangelists that can't even program. Their community forums are a dumpster fire where users act like "my way or the world is going to end" (see the current username discussion. Most people are fair but you see[0]). Anything they say on Twitter gets spammed with questions about usernames by people that can't be bothered to see that it is in alpha testing and available for custom builds. And on HN everyone criticizes Signal and compares it to Matrix which is always better for every single purpose.
I do like Signal and I think they have done a lot of good. I do think they have a lot of valid criticism against them but also I think a lot of people aren't providing useful criticism (it is a shame that's happening here, on a forum that should be filled with tech experts). People also aren't realistic. A 25 person team working at a non-profit aren't going to have the same development capacity as a 250 person team.
[0] (maybe go to the bottom) https://community.signalusers.org/t/usernames-in-signal/9157
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#373Earlier quoted context omitted.
If I understand this, if I use SMS, I can send to everyone. If I use Signal, I can send to Signal users only. But I don't remember who's on Signal, and who's not. So I guess I will stop using Signal.
If I want to message someone I open the contact and click on one of the messengers that are listed for the phone number. Why would I leave the memorizing to my brain?
Huh. I've never used contacts that way. I suppose it could work but that's a new extra step. My Contacts list is gigantic and full of bullshit I don't care about because it's sync'd from work and flooded with people I don't know. Usually I just find the conversation from the chronological list (which is more of how I remember things). Maybe there's some way to sort contacts by recent use? It just seems like that's leaking metadata to push all of that context into Contacts. Anyway that seems maybe plausible if it can index or springboard to convos in other apps.
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#374Wow :-(
Just a week ago I replaced the sms app with signal for two people.
This was the main reason why I just installed signal and still use it vs telegram because of this exact feature :-(
Come on signal what ya doing stop!
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#375Well there you have it, these crooks probably accepted a few million$ by the feds to kill the app.
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#376Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd take a decent "export my chats" option. I have chat history that goes back years that it's often convenient to be able to search. I'd love to be able to move it off the device, but instead the Signal backup just keeps getting larger and larger. To be clear, Signal allows you to backup and restore back into Signal on android, which is great. What I meant is that it would be helpful to be able to export that conten…
> I have chat history that goes back years that it's often convenient to be able to search. > but instead the Signal backup just keeps getting larger and larger... One begets the other. > I'd love to be able to move it off the device If you don't want infinite history, set a conversation length limit. It is in the storage settings. If you want to backup messages on iOS go complain here[0]. For Android, you already ha…
If I set a conversation length limit though it prevents my ability to search back through my history, which is the feature I'd like to preserve. I value that history, it's useful to me.
My ideal solution would be to export any message older than a month to an archive on my NAS, ideally in a format that the app could search on request. Keep my history, keep the on-device space nice and small.
I take advantage of the Android backup feature, and the backup syncs over to my NAS via SyncThing automatically, but that's only useful for restoring a brand new phone up to the latest state.
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#377Earlier quoted context omitted.
This. I've switched to iOS recently and I hate that I need two apps now. Already longing to go back to Android.
Just use iMessage. It's not as secure as Signal since the server has the keys, but it's the easiest way to ensure that the majority of text messages you send are encrypted. There was just an article that said that 88% of teens have an iPhone. That means that almost all of their communication is encrypted.
So when the server has the key, how can you say it's encrypted?
I mean in context of signal we don't just talk about some form of transport encryption but e2e
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#378I'm sad. I actually donate to signal every month, but now that will likely stop and I'll have look for alternatives.
Rip. This is definitely going to make it harder to get signal adoption. My partner will surely stop using it too now and I'll have to convince my friends to migrate to yet another platform.
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#379I'm very upset by this decision. I've been using Signal as my SMS app for a very long time. Messages that I would have sent via SMS currently will automatically get sent via Signal if the person I'm sending to has started using Signal without my knowledge. This has happened in several instances where I was pleasantly surprised to see a friend had started using Signal. Now that I'm forced into a separate SMS app, this…
Off topic slightly, but it amazes me how much SMS is used in outside my country (maybe just US?). I literally never SMS any personal contacts, usually WhatsApp. Even business stuff, sometimes initial contact may be SMS and then could often move to WhatsApp.
I use signal with a small circle of friends, but no one I know uses SMS anymore.
Re: Removing SMS support from Signal Android (soon)
#380This is bizarre. If this were an in-depth announcement with a long and well-structured technical justification attached, I could understand. Though I suspect I'd likely disagree with the decision, I could probably accept it as a simple different of opinion if the arguments were evidently well-thought-through and considered. This blog-post is so lightweight. There's no technical analysis. There's barely any justificat…
I guess to be fair it lets them design and support a single UX since iOS doesn't allow them to have SMS in the UX. That could have been a good argument.
Of course, they didn't bother make that argument.
And in the SMS domain Google Messages really does get annoying with the whole Google Messages vs iMessage and how nothing Google is doing with RCS benefits anyone except Google. As Google continues its war on SMS and force migration of everyone to RCS, Signal users on Android end up being the red-headed step child. That also is a good technical/strategic argument for ditching SMS.
But, again, not one that they even bothered make.
And there's always been the "tied to a phone number" issue that's been the #1 complaint about Signal. And once untethered from SMS who cares about phone numbers anymore.
Once again, not even a case they bothered to make.