this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2024
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[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Matrix isn't the only alternative, there's also rocketchat

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (5 children)

The elephant in the room is IRC. Which continues to work fine and hosts huge FOSS communities. Self hosting it is even better as you can use a more modern version like ergo.chat than the large networks sadly utilize.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

But IRC doesn't really support E2EE in 1:1 chats right? Because that's something very important for me. I don't want to use an app only for public channels I ideally would like to use it for everything. Including messaging the people I know.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

There are some ways to make it work with OTR, but realistically speaking no.

Personally I get around that by using XMPP and connecting to IRC via the excellent Biboumi gateway. Thus I get the best of both, as XMPP is working really well for e2ee 1:1 chats.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

IRCv3 has a lot of features & is good, but if you need encrypted chat and/or want to support decentralization XMPP MUCs can fit the bill similar being just a bit less lightweight.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Does IRC have a pluralkit equivalent?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

You made me look again at IRC V3, seems like they support threads and emoji reactions. I might give it a try

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I use IRC in Matrix, and have used IRC since the 90s, but IRC lacks many modern features, even simple things like configurable push notifications and universal encryption, perhaps ergo is better? But then again, the reason I chose Lemmy was distribution, so...

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Heh, push notifications and universal encryption are about the opposite of simple and fail to work on Matrix most of the time. Most of the actually simple and useful features for a public chat are supported by Ergo though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

What issues have you had? Using Element worked out of the box for me on both. Even spun up my own server with a docker compose and it worked fine there, too.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Large public rooms have constant issues with encryption, and since you can't turn it off once enabled (yeah 🤦‍♂️) most public rooms are not e2ee. Besides the fact that e2ee doesn't really make sense in public rooms as anyone can join.

Push notifications in Matrix clients only work with the help of Google's or Apple's centralized infrastructure. This is of course only partially the fault of Matrix, but XMPP for example can do it without pretty well.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

push notifications also work degoogled on element and fluffychat, what do you mean?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Source? I am pretty sure you need workarounds like Unified Push to a 3rd party app then.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yes, FluffyChat wants ntfy but Element has their own background service in the F-Droid package. Still fits the bill of not using Google infrastructure.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

These support UnifiedPush, not just ntfy. UnifiedPush is an open protocol whereas ntfy is an implementation of UnifiedPush. I use my Prosody server to deliver my UnifiiedPush notifications.