Signal Introduces Story Time

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

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  • session-android

    A private messenger for Android.

  • https://getsession.org/

    * Doesn't require users to provide a phone number.

    * Doesn't use centralized servers.

    Hopefully Session will stay legit for a while. Just when I get most of contacts on Signal, Signal moves to embed crypto payments in the app and starts pushing Storytime.

    https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/signal.html

  • simplex-chat

    SimpleX - the first messaging network operating without user identifiers of any kind - 100% private by design! iOS, Android and desktop apps 📱!

  • https://simplex.chat/ is iterating on this. There’s a lot of pros and cons to any design of private group chats from the perspective of privacy, performance and single points of failure.

  • WorkOS

    The modern identity platform for B2B SaaS. The APIs are flexible and easy-to-use, supporting authentication, user identity, and complex enterprise features like SSO and SCIM provisioning.

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  • Signal-Android

    Fork from a private messenger for Android with extra options added: full backup and (partial, ony text) xml backup of messages. Restore can happen at any time, not only after a fresh install. Import SMS database. Import of (unencrypted) WhatsApp databases. Removed apk expire. Choose between passphrase protection and the Android screenlock. Choice for the backup location (internal or removable storage on Android < 11 (on 11 and higher this is already possible)). Set the maptype in the place picke (by johanw666)

  • Just use Johann's fork with SMS support and no APK expiration and don't update it. This would either buy you some months before proper alternative will be introduced or at best work infinitely.

    https://github.com/johanw666/Signal-Android/releases

  • OpenDocument.droid

    It's Android's first OpenOffice Document Reader!

  • That appears to be because Session uses Firebase as a dependency.

    https://github.com/opendocument-app/OpenDocument.droid/issue...

    Per F-Droid's definition of "the upstream source code is not entirely free":

    https://f-droid.org/en/docs/Anti-Features/#UpstreamNonFree

    This seems to be a case of "damned if you do; damned if you don't". Session relies on Firebase to get faster notifications from Google servers. This can be disabled in the applications preferences but changes the behavior from push-notifications to polling Session's decentralized messaging network, which makes messages notifications slower.

    https://getsession.org/faq#push-notifications

    For the sake of clarity it would be nice if instead of making such a vague pronouncement, F-Droid would specify precisely what about the upstream source code is not entirely free.

    https://forum.f-droid.org/t/the-upstream-source-code-is-not-...

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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