I can switch to Matrix and talk to the two other users on this platform! Can’t wait!
Comment on A fresh install of Signal takes up 410MB, blowing both Firefox and Chromium out of the water
philpo@feddit.de 3 weeks ago
That’s why I am so happy that I switched to Matrix - selfhosted with Signal and WhatsApp Bridges(amongst others) and now I only need to keep one App on our mobiles, Notebooks,desktop,etc. but I can still communicate with everyone. (we have have a few mixed groups now)
ealoe@ani.social 3 weeks ago
philpo@feddit.de 3 weeks ago
Yeah, 115 Million users atm. And as I said - you can easily bridge it to other services so you only use Matrix but communicate with others.
alyth@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I’ll give you a little anecdote. I joined a casual server on Matrix recently. Two minutes into the conversation, it turns out the person I was talking to is installing some Linux stuff and watching an episode of classic Doctor Who. That’s two of my biggest interests right there that we immediately connected over. If there are only two users on Matrix, they’re the only two I need.
Takumidesh@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I think the vast majority of people are more interested in talking to people they know in real life.
alyth@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Your post encouraged me to self host Matrix ^^ That’ll be a nice project for the next rainy day
Mikina@programming.dev 3 weeks ago
I self-hosted it few months ago, and it’s actually surprisingly easy! Someone has made an Ansible script for Matrix with Element and some bridges, that (at least a month ago, IaaC tends to be pretty fragile) worked out of the box on a first try. I just set up some config values (mostly about enabling bridges I want) based on their amazing documentation, and then ran it once and everything is working so far. I even updated it several times already, and every time it was smooth, and it was basically just running a single ansible command. Their documentation is pretty well written, and with my basic cloud, IT and Linux knowledge I had no issues with following it. All you need to know is how to set up cloud VM, get a domain and set DNS, and set up SSH keys to access the server.
In total it took me about two hours in total, from when I decided “I’m setting up Matrix tonight” without any prior knowledge, looking up my options and finding the ansible script, setting up cloud and getting Matrix up and running.
I’m renting a VM on Hetzner for like 6$ per month, and it worked without issues so far. I use it for Discord and Messenger, although the Meta bridge does have some problems, for example I didn’t figure out how to message someone with whom I haven’t had a conversation since I set up the bridge, since only then it creates the room for it. But that can be solved by keeping the Messenger app or usign the browser to send a first message, and it immediately shows in your Matrix bridge (and stays there forever).
alyth@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Thank you for sharing your setup, this kind of information is always extremely valuable <3
philpo@feddit.de 3 weeks ago
Thanks,welcome to the club! It can be a bit “tricky” at times (and I use a container manager,cloudron, meanwhile as I got too deep into the rabbit hole and now host too many things to maintain them myself) but once you get it set up it’s rock solid.
And I am really optimistic for Element X/Matrix 2.0.
It’s a great standard.
alyth@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Gonna repeat what I said to Mikina - Thank you for sharing your setup, this kind of information is always extremely valuable <3
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Is Matrix another one of those apps that when you click on a download link it takes you to a page full of tech jargon shit like “nightly signed beta configs here, just unjibble the .trag file and recombobulate with a python scrab to mambo directory: AAATGFHHOLLLM56888NGAAA.tar.gz” ?
Or is it like an app normal people can use?
Lazycog@sopuli.xyz 3 weeks ago
Of course not,
with the new encapsulator all you need is to reconfigure your turbomutator to allow electrostabilizer executable to directly read instructions from your self-hosted AI model.
Who even uses python to scrab anymore? Install podman dude.
Aqarius@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Podman breaks the retroencabulation.
sczlbutt@lemmy.pubsub.fun 3 weeks ago
If you want to deal with the perpendicular crosstalk caused by the coaxial flutter...
philpo@feddit.de 3 weeks ago
I don’t have the time nor the crayons to explain that to you.
discount_door_garlic@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
as a big proponent of FOSS I see where you’re coming from - but the reality will always be that apps which have a significant learning curve to even install are obviously hugely off-putting to the majority of users. While the rest of us might be comfortable cloning a repository and building from a tar file, expecting the average person who wants to talk with friends and family to jump through those kind of hoops is exactly what has held back wider adoption of better standards.
Things like flatpacks and snaps have gone a long way to making this less daunting, but when matrix isn’t a ‘self-hosted decentralised chat’, it’s a *‘version of whatsapp that isn’t always online, and i don’t know where to download it and have to learn what the terminal is to even get it on my laptop’ * - we can’t be surprised people stick with the less secure, private, easy options. That’s why I’m a big advocate of signal - it’s not perfect and part of me wishes it was matrix or threema or one of the other standards, but getting people comfortable with the idea of free and open source software, while making it as simple for them to install on their phone or computer as anything meta makes is a really good first step - in the meantime, it’s up to us in the wider community to make the other solutions more intuitive, simple, secure, and trust that if a good enough job is done of that - they will come.
Cryophilia@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I managed to get my parents on signal because it’s functionally a WhatsApp clone
KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
i think part of the problem is that stuff like matrix is built for a very specific interface. Where as we could build something like matrix, in a different design meta, more akin to something like mumble, which not only greatly simplifies the construction of it, but also greatly simplifies administration of it. The protocol itself shouldn’t innately require an obtuse arbitrary system that makes it a nightmare.
Anything that is remotely related to “web apps” or web in general, seems to be an utter fucking nightmare these days. I think we need a healthy dose of dedicated native applications.
philpo@feddit.de 3 weeks ago
Sorry,but have you at least read the wikipedia article before writing this post?
Matrix is a standard. Not an App. Just like Lemmy is.
There are dozens of clients (Element, Schildichat, Fuzzychat, Beeper) available to download for basically every system imaginable and in all major Appstores.
You can easily join an existing instance - and with beeper there is even one existing that handles all the bridges for you.
Only when you self-host it gets more tricky-just like it does with Lemmy(as a matter of fact Matrix is far easier to selfhost than Lemmy). And again there are various distributions available. They aren’t as easy as the clients and not as easy as flatpacks, but someone who has done their due diligence can absolutely handle them easily. (And self-hosting should absolutely not be “as easy as flatpacks/snaps” - the risk for both the admin and the net itself is too high). But again: The average user has little incentive to selfhost. Just like you don’t selfhost your Lemmy instance.
The Matrix environment is as easy to use as Signal, Threema, WhatsApp for ages now. In some points I would even argue that it’s more user friendly than Signal,btw.
TseseJuer@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I think you mean lazy illiterate people. just pay Google/amazon and be done with it
ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net 3 weeks ago
Don’t be an elitist bung hole, dude.
TseseJuer@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
elitist because I said they don’t want to read? lol ok
FractalsInfinite@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
It’s website seems to have had a graphic designer look over it. It seems to do the best of both worlds where you can download the default user friendly client or choose to go down the jargon route if you want to.
JackbyDev@programming.dev 3 weeks ago
It’s not quite that bad but it was trickier than Lemmy.
vox@sopuli.xyz 3 weeks ago
it’s as easy to get into as lemmy/masto/fedi