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Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#471

Post by aestetix »

aestetix wrote: post #466
vesak wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But many of these decisions-- dropping Google Reader, the trend to ditch the headphone jack, and now Slack killing IRC-- seem to be made for no apparent logic reason, and giving some bullshit excuse like "security reasons." Google Reader didn't bring Google more money, even indirectly. Removing the headphone jack leads to less cables and less open holes in the device. Slack's IRC gateway wasn't very good, and nobod…

> Google Reader didn't bring Google more money, even indirectly. Was there a way to pay for it? Further, even if a feature doesn't bring money, does it cost sufficient money to maintain to merit removing? Why not just open source it and let the community maintain it? > Removing the headphone jack leads to less cables and less open holes in the device. The stated excuse for this was to allow the system to be thinner.…

On some further reflection, it seems that the "paid feature for free" argument could translate into "security", and thus explain Slack's strange messaging. That is so far the most logical explanation I've heard. Thanks for helping me understand!

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#472

Post by hultner »

WeeChat Slack API plugin (works without IRC-gateway)

https://github.com/wee-slack/wee-slack

Background

I'm not associated but I thought I had to share this. Since about a year back I've migrated to wee-slack for slack usage in my WeeChat IRC-client, it's also possible to use WeeChat as a bouncer through WeeChat relay (if not mistaken there's irssi-proxy:esque proxy-plugin too).

I've been a die hard irssi-fan and still use it for much of my IRC interaction and been using weechat as a irssi-like slack client. As a bonus we can use many of the features that didn't work through the irc-gateway.

You can also see a preview of my setup on my twitter

https://twitter.com/ahultner/status/923588418126348289

If you're interested of my personal setup you can find it in my dotfiles

https://github.com/Hultner/dotfiles/tree/master/cetrezMBP/.w...

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#473

Post by Zak »

tommorris wrote: post #452
Zak wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tangentially related, I have to take issue with this: > addressing with user-owned identifiers like phone numbers Phone numbers are owned by telecoms, not users. Sometimes they're transferable between telecoms, but not always. I, in particular travel internationally often and do not maintain phone service in the same country continuously. I've had to change phone numbers with Signal and Whatsapp a couple times now an…

> I don't know that I have a better design in mind Simple: usernames. Humans are not phone numbers. Phone numbers are the IP addresses of legacy phone networks.

Usernames do not solve the problems described in the link:

* They're not portable. My username here is Zak. It is on reddit as well, but I think that's the only other place. If I don't discover a service within it's first week of operation, I won't get that username, and many won't allow it because it's "too short".

* They don't tap into users' existing contact lists. I've discovered several people I know using Signal because I had their phone numbers stored in my phone's contacts.

But if a new communications protocol is to replace the legacy phone network, which I consider desirable, it probably shouldn't use identifiers tied to the legacy phone network.

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#474

Post by hultner »

saagarjha wrote: post #11

I'm very disappointed to see that Slack has decided to go the way of every other messaging service and move away from decentralized and standardized protocols towards those that are walled and proprietary. > We are focused on making Slack accessible to all people. Over the past year, we've made great progress in improving both the keyboard and screen reading experiences in Slack. We know many users have been relying…

For anyone who like me want to keep using slack via irc there's a solution using weechat. See my other comment for more info

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16544045

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#475

Post by dajohnson89 »

Spivak wrote: post #322
dfabulich wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The IRC gateway was there to mollify people who said "IRC is better! I refuse to switch!" Slack advocates could say, "Don't worry, you don't have to switch. You can just keep using your IRC client with Slack. Everybody else will have a web UI, which they prefer, and you can keep using Irssi. Everybody wins."

Right, and now that everyone is hooked the loud minority (if we're being honest with ourselves) have to choose between speaking the Slack protocol or losing access to our contacts. Are we doomed as a community to be surprised every time a company with power squeezes?

Embrace IRC. There are some excellent IRC clients, such as IRCCloud[0]. With web & mobile versions. I'm on IRC all the time, and there's still lots of good stuff there. I've been an IRC user for 15 years, and haven't lost any contacts due to arbitrary corporate decisions.

[0]: https://www.irccloud.com/

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#476

Post by blindgeek »

DrJokepu wrote: post #256
blindgeek wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So much this! I happen to be a blind software developer who has had just this sort of experience in years gone by. Web apps mean that you are at the mercy of the developers. Something can work one day and break the next. This is even more true for blind people than it is for the general public. Even if there is accessibility testing, I doubt that it covers my particular toolstack. I'm on Linux. So I'm doubly a niche…

Out of curiosity, what is your toolstack?

I use emacs with emacspeak for programming and a good many other things. For pure terminal interaction outside of emacs I use a console-based screen reader called Speakup. For graphical applications, I use a screenreader called Orca. I don't use a whole lot of graphical applications, but I need Firefox for most of the "modern" web. I've also used Chrome with Chromevox over the years.

Honestly I prefer text-mode browsers when I can use them, but that ship has mostly sailed. I've been involved with the development of edbrowse; the author is a friend of mine.

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#477

Post by linedash »

michaelt wrote: post #429
noobermin wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who doesn't use slack, why did we ever move away from chat programs and protocols that worked fine? I don't know why I need to use slack, hangouts, discord, etc, that are just reinventing irc and/or the garden variety instant messaging platforms that already exist.

I don't know why I need to use slack [...] just reinventing irc Features Slack has that IRC doesn't include: * User authentication * Support for multiple concurrent logins by one user * Persistent, searchable history * (Ad-free) file and image sharing built in * Simple integrations, like webhooks, built in. In other words, Slack is like IRC+NickServ+Irssi+Screen+Imgur, except easier to use, in the sense that you don'…

Not to mention the webhooks. It's trivial to implement pushing data into slack.

They even give you a hello world sample curl when you opt to add the webhook. At the simplest you can just replace the hello world text and bam -- you're sending to slack. Just takes a very simple json input.

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#478

Post by gaius »

ndarilek wrote: post #277
blindgeek wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So much this! I happen to be a blind software developer who has had just this sort of experience in years gone by. Web apps mean that you are at the mercy of the developers. Something can work one day and break the next. This is even more true for blind people than it is for the general public. Even if there is accessibility testing, I doubt that it covers my particular toolstack. I'm on Linux. So I'm doubly a niche…

Oh man, makes me so happy to see the accessibility concerns at the top of this thread. I hate Slack so much. Nothing has made me say "is 10 AM too early for a beer?" quite so much as that absolute pile of uselessness. I thought they'd actually improved their accessibility story when my screen reader read various elements as buttons. Later I discovered that, while they'd likely added the correct ARIA role to a , they…

Oh man, makes me so happy to see the accessibility concerns at the top of this thread

Being “able-bodied” is only temporary, for everyone. Any dev that doesn’t realize this will eventually come to regret it as they age.

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#479

Post by tommorris »

nasredin wrote: post #454
tommorris wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't know that I have a better design in mind Simple: usernames. Humans are not phone numbers. Phone numbers are the IP addresses of legacy phone networks.

Obligatory plug for Tox. http://tox.chat A lot of countries require require registering the phone number to your name. Relying on phone numbers as uniqie identifiers especially in "crypto" hipster apps (Signal) is stupid bordering on malicious

The reason people use Signal over WhatsApp is partly because of a perception it is more likely to be good against malicious state-like actors: tyrannical regimes etc.

If said malicious actors pwn the phone of the person you were talking to, suddenly they have a pretty good way of mapping a contact called "My Best Friend" to a human through billing records.

Or even easier, they type the phone number into Google and find that the Syrian dissident they've just arrested has been corresponding with the NYTimes or BBC.

If they know only that they are talking to anonymoushackzor@gmail.com they could, uh, get Google to release their IP address. Google are fairly unlikely to honour a legal demand for disclosure from Libya or North Korea or some other tyrannical/fucked-up hellhole.

I like Signal, but I'm not totally sure about the threat model.

Re: Tell HN: Slack decides to close down IRC and XMPP gateways

#480

Post by dullgiulio »

nasredin wrote: post #468
dullgiulio wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

E-mail is not preferred by the youth until they use it at work. Then it is a godsend that you can only ignore it and reply when you have time. We have been chatting since we have had networks. Believe me, e-mail is here to stay.

Maybe we could do something about voicemail then? ducks

What do you mean? Voicemail was never successful and the reason is simple: verba volant, scripta manent, spoken flies, written remains.
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