Matrix 2.0: The Future of Matrix

This page summarizes the projects mentioned and recommended in the original post on news.ycombinator.com

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  • SurveyJS - Open-Source JSON Form Builder to Create Dynamic Forms Right in Your App
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  • Element

    A glossy Matrix collaboration client for the web.

  • The main remaining Nebuchadnezzar issue is mitigating server-controlled group membership. The first step has been to kill off the 1st gen E2EE implementations, which were responsible for the implementation vulns found by RHUL - and we should hopefully conclude that next week by moving everything into the matrix-rust-sdk crypto create implmentation: https://github.com/vector-im/element-web/issues/21972#issuec... is the tracker.

    Then, we can address the harder server-controlled group membership issue in one place. First step will be to improve device verification & trust so that trust is the default, not the exception, to make it easier to spot and warn about unexpected devices in the room. The full solution is then either MSC3917 (https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/blob/fay...) - or potentially to switch everything to MLS.

    We're working on MLS anyway in parallel to RHUL mitigation work; you can see the progress at https://arewemlsyet.com, and it's looking good.

    I'm guessing you're not interested in doing a podcast on "yay we converged our crypto implementations on a single robust Rust implementation so we can fix the remaining bugs in one place", but as soon as the server-controlled group membership thing is solved we'll be in touch. Work has also gone much slower than hoped on this, thanks to the joys of funding open source.

  • element-meta

    Shared/meta documentation and project artefacts for Element clients

  • It's quite disappointing that there's huge ongoing work around reinventing clients from scratch where the basic functionality of not ringing all my devices while I'm using only one of them [1] is still not there (bug open for years), despite it being a pretty simple fix.

    [1] https://github.com/vector-im/element-meta/issues/360

  • SurveyJS

    Open-Source JSON Form Builder to Create Dynamic Forms Right in Your App. With SurveyJS form UI libraries, you can build and style forms in a fully-integrated drag & drop form builder, render them in your JS app, and store form submission data in any backend, inc. PHP, ASP.NET Core, and Node.js.

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  • element-ios

    A glossy Matrix collaboration client for iOS

  • There are quite a few issues that they've stopped fixing in the Element app in favor of doing it in Element X, the one I've been following is where the iOS app causes a breakage in E2EE when you use the share extension, so they just disabled the share extension entirely and said they'd fix in X - https://github.com/vector-im/element-ios/issues/7618

    But X requires Sliding Sync on the server, which is still a separate service to run alongside the homeserver and doesn't have a stable API, much less a spec (?). I am increasingly disappointed with how centralized Matrix is becoming, since AFAIK there isn't really an alternate client close to the same level of quality as Element.

    I probably would've made all of the same decisions myself though, so I don't blame them I'm just a bit disappointed in how it's shaking out.

  • facebook

    Discontinued A Matrix-Facebook Messenger puppeting bridge (by mautrix)

  • My Facebook bridge constantly locks up my account. [1]

    [1] https://github.com/mautrix/facebook/issues/236

  • matrix-spec-proposals

    Proposals for changes to the matrix specification

  • The main remaining Nebuchadnezzar issue is mitigating server-controlled group membership. The first step has been to kill off the 1st gen E2EE implementations, which were responsible for the implementation vulns found by RHUL - and we should hopefully conclude that next week by moving everything into the matrix-rust-sdk crypto create implmentation: https://github.com/vector-im/element-web/issues/21972#issuec... is the tracker.

    Then, we can address the harder server-controlled group membership issue in one place. First step will be to improve device verification & trust so that trust is the default, not the exception, to make it easier to spot and warn about unexpected devices in the room. The full solution is then either MSC3917 (https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-spec-proposals/blob/fay...) - or potentially to switch everything to MLS.

    We're working on MLS anyway in parallel to RHUL mitigation work; you can see the progress at https://arewemlsyet.com, and it's looking good.

    I'm guessing you're not interested in doing a podcast on "yay we converged our crypto implementations on a single robust Rust implementation so we can fix the remaining bugs in one place", but as soon as the server-controlled group membership thing is solved we'll be in touch. Work has also gone much slower than hoped on this, thanks to the joys of funding open source.

  • element-x-ios

    Next generation Matrix client for iOS built with SwiftUI on top of matrix-rust-sdk.

  • And the cake under the cherry is… Element X is open-source[1][2]!

    I really can't wait for Beeper[3] to rebuild their fork on top of Element X (it's currently based on Element, formerly called Riot). If this happens this will be an absolute game-changer in the messaging ecosystem.

    [1] https://github.com/vector-im/element-x-ios

    [2] https://github.com/vector-im/element-x-android

    [3] https://www.beeper.com/

  • element-x-android

    Android Matrix messenger application using the Matrix Rust Sdk and Jetpack Compose

  • And the cake under the cherry is… Element X is open-source[1][2]!

    I really can't wait for Beeper[3] to rebuild their fork on top of Element X (it's currently based on Element, formerly called Riot). If this happens this will be an absolute game-changer in the messaging ecosystem.

    [1] https://github.com/vector-im/element-x-ios

    [2] https://github.com/vector-im/element-x-android

    [3] https://www.beeper.com/

  • InfluxDB

    Power Real-Time Data Analytics at Scale. Get real-time insights from all types of time series data with InfluxDB. Ingest, query, and analyze billions of data points in real-time with unbounded cardinality.

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  • rust-synapse-compress-state

    A tool to compress some state in a Synapse instance's database

  • Yup, it's true that sliding sync proxy increases disk space further, although it's not so bad. A big advantage once it's stable and merged into a native homeserver will be reducing the storage duplication between the proxy and the HS.

    Meanwhile, we really need to get https://github.com/matrix-org/rust-synapse-compress-state/pu... hooked up in Synapse so that it automatically compresses state; I don't know why this never landed when it was written in in 2021 :(

  • element-call

    Group calls powered by Matrix

  • Looks like there's an open protocol and an open source client implementation for video calls. https://github.com/vector-im/element-call

    This is great! Jitsi has never clicked for me. I tried it a few times, and read about it, and was never excited about it. I just tried Element Call, albeit an empty room, and the UI feels right.

  • matrix-docker-ansible-deploy

    🐳 Matrix (An open network for secure, decentralized communication) server setup using Ansible and Docker

  • element-android

    A glossy Matrix collaboration client for Android.

  • Multiple accounts also https://github.com/vector-im/element-android/issues/26

NOTE: The number of mentions on this list indicates mentions on common posts plus user suggested alternatives. Hence, a higher number means a more popular project.

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