this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2024
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[–] [email protected] 67 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (6 children)

If anyone is looking for an alternative to discord, please check out revolt.chat The interface and user experience is the closest I've seen to discord (miles better than any Matrix client), has functioning voice chat (being rebuilt for more stability) custom server roles, and a functioning youtube music bot called Remix. They're doing awesome work over there!

Edit: Forgot to mention that it's also open-source and self-hostable (although not federated)

[–] [email protected] 22 points 9 months ago (3 children)

I think the problem with projects like that is they end up with stuff like this: https://i.imgur.com/PRX4haL.png where the only recommended client is one that is unmaintained.

Though I hope Revolt succeeds because Discord has way too big of a monopoly.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Though I hope Revolt succeeds because Discord has way too big of a monopoly.

I don’t understand why everyone thought moving everything to discord was a good idea that wouldn’t backfire for a million reasons.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

By chance do you happen to use Revolt? If so, do you (or @[email protected]) know which client might be good to use?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

I have just started using it, but I’m planing to migrate my small Discord group over to Revolt.

If you go to their website revolt.chat it’ll offer a download for desktop or a link to the web app, but they’re basically the same. They’re working on an updated client called Frontend which you can get a beta of from GitHub.

I’m on an iPhone and I used the save to Home Screen function in Safari while in the web app to get an icon for it, and I think it works pretty well! It can even do push notifications, but some weird artifacts of using the web app on mobile mean you’ll only get notifications from mentions in a server or a direct message (or group message).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

well i use guilded the most

[–] [email protected] 18 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I did try it, but it was missing video streaming last I checked. Also, they made self hosting without docker incredibly difficult.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

may I ask why you'd prefer setting things up manually without docker?

Imho, copy & pasting a provided docker-compose is much simpler.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It’s mostly about having the ability and wanting to avoid any extra layers of abstraction. I think docker takes up more disk space than pure install but not 100% on that. Only app that I have w docker is Immich right now and would love to just uninstall docker entirely but … I can’t.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

that's true. Docker images indeed take up more space, especially if you don't prune old unused images, it can quickly pile up.

to mitigate that, always go with the alpine-version of a service (if it's available) since these are much smaller in size and are barely noticable.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

New apps should be Docker compatible out of the box, change my mind.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (2 children)

An app that expects to be widely distributed and used but is Docker exclusive failed before even starting.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

First of all, I said "compatible", not "exclusive". Second of all, why would it fail? Even if there was no tutorial how to run it directly on a system, a docker image carries all the information you need to run it on a given system. That's why we have Dockerfiles.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

We like to think that what we are doing is the only valid way of doing things, specially when we are on the bleeding edge, and we forget that there's a whole world of people and possibilities (and a history before ourselves) for whom our one solution is not the holy grail for. Not every production environment or homelab is centered around containerization. Yes, it is cool and useful, but it doesn't exhaust every use case. Some people just don't use containers and if your app is exclusively available that way, then it's extra work to use it, or it just won't even be considered at all.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

The wisdom of moving slowly and fixing things

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Thank you. I would prefer not to install docker, that is just a personal preference, but so many apps are like uhh, we don’t know how to run this without Docker. Usually there is a way buried in layers of github issues but just like.. why.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 9 months ago

If the app is not Dockerized, it's useless.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (4 children)
[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I've got a Matrix server up and running and have tried a couple of different clients, but at the end of the day the Matrix UX isn't really an alternative to Discord, rather an alternative to Facebook Messenger/WhatsApp or other group message platforms.

The main thing I would point to is that Matrix itself only does text; the Element client uses Jitsi to add in audio/video calls and screensharing, but at least right now, it's the only Matrix client to integrate voice, video, or screenshare.

My other gripes are just with the user interface, but if you open any of the Matrix mobile apps and compare it to Facebook Messenger and to the Discord mobile app, and you'll see it really doesn't look like Discord. I wish I could quantify it better, but Matrix just doesn't feel like Discord whereas Revolt does.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

The main thing I would point to is that Matrix itself only does text; the Element client uses Jitsi to add in audio/video calls and screensharing [...]

Matrix VoIP is a thing, and it's usable for audio & video on many clients, element and fluffychat come to mind, but probably more.

element call is also coming into element (and possibly other clients) for video calls and screensharing

My other gripes are just with the user interface, [...] it really doesn’t look like Discord

why does that matter?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago

installed userbase and the inertial resistance of individuals users (and even more so as a group)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Not Similar to Discord

[–] ScreaminOctopus 2 points 9 months ago

No voice chatrooms so it's not similar. The most similar open source solution I've seen is Mumble

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

what's the license?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Jumping from one proprietary system to another isn't really an improvement.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

At least you have control over your data and you and your friends can blame you for server crashes lol.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 9 months ago (2 children)

I didn't realize it was possible to host your own backend locally... I thought it was just hosting the webUI locally.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

Yep, you can host it all yourself. Both UI and the server. Not sure how backwards compatible the "public" client is - I remember Rocket.chat Android client breaking by not updating the server on at least 2 occasions over the past 2 years.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Nah, I remember the FMHY crowd keeping their own instance up

[–] [email protected] 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

Ventrillo and Teamspeak as well

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (3 children)

what the fuck was wrong with IRC

[–] [email protected] 16 points 9 months ago

No voice chat, mainly. I don't want to play League and chat on IRC lol.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

About a dozen modern QoL features, like not having to host your own server to be able to receive messages on mobile clients