matrix-react-sdk VS documentation

There's already an (old pull request)[https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/9240] out for custom emotes for the element client but is blocked by acceptance of spec and other minor issues with code style.

You are completely misinterpreting my quote, which makes me question whether you are acting in good faith.

Totally agreed that Signal servers cannot just add a device to a group chat.

What I saying was: in any system, you have to verify users for security in general. Having verified users in Matrix, you then get a massive red warning if an unverified device is added to their accounts. Given we have cross-signing (i.e. users are heavily encouraged to verify their own devices when they log in), you can be sure that such unverified devices are malicious and take appropriate action.

The obvious thing we could do is to go one step further (as we used to, until we backed it out in https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/3837) and stop messages from flowing until the unverified device has been dealt with. Even better would be to make group membership controlled by the clients, so the server can't add devices at all. And we're working on this, as part of shifting the implementations over to the audited matrix-rust-sdk-crypto implementation to avoid having to solve the problem in quadruplicate.

> I would challenge you to get one reputable cryptographer to back what you’re claiming about these vulnerabilities and your proposed fixes.

Hopefully someone will pop up here and confirm that I'm not talking shit :) Failing that, you'll have to wait for the next Least Authority audit - we have another independent public audit queued once this wave of work finishes to address the "To me Matrix isn't secure" polemicists. You can see the previous one (on the crypto layer, rather than the group membership layer) at https://matrix.org/blog/2022/05/16/independent-public-audit-... fwiw.

1. We are about to replace the composer in Element with a sparkly new (optional) wysiwyg editor in the coming weeks: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-wysiwyg

2. totally agreed. we are completely reworking the crypto UX; there’s already https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/8228 asa proof of concept of what’s to come.

3. glad you like Cinny - it’s written by ajbura, whose dayjob is at Element and built the UI for Third Room. Element is not “the official app” - it’s just the one that happens to be written by folks from the Matrix core team. If you prefer Cinny, knock yourself out. Meanwhile we’re frantically improving Element too.

Unlike any open source projects to which I've contributed, this project involves 2 other repos, matrix-react-sdk and matrix-js-sdk. As explained in the Development guide in the element-web repo, I need those 2 SDKs in order to build Element successfully for code contribution.

> Also, you can do toggle mute via hotkey (which we have a draft for at https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/2280), but this is surely a bonus feature.

Proper Push-To-Talk with global hotkey is one of those features that doesn't seem important but when you need it (organizing Raids in games, big meetings, etc) it makes a world of difference. That and lack of click to join voice rooms is definitely making it harder to move gaming groups over.

Encryption is now enabled by default for 1:1 chats. There's an MR for adding GIF support but looks like they are not interested in it.

This is a really common failure mode - people forget to explicitly assert that the other modifiers are off when checking for a modifier being on. I had to go through and fix all the ones in matrix-react-sdk (element web) a few years ago: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-react-sdk/pull/825/file...

Exposing the desktopCapturer to the render process and then using it inside the web app

I believe it can. The protocol seems pretty thoroughly documented https://developers.revolt.chat/

Great to see innovation, but it doesn't federate. Being open source alone doesn't bring users freedoms when it comes to social networks. Think of Signal for example, which is very locked down. Social networks/apps/etc. have their moat in their userbase, not the code. Not even tik tok with its famous recommendation algorithm. Reddit used to be open source, now isn't. Forks couldn't take off because the users were/are on the main fork. If it doesn't federate, the network being open source right now helps little. It can be closed any day and users can't do anything about it because >90% don't care.