Matrix

I have used Matrix for some time now and yet the only reason is that I find it the least bad open-source messaging app.
Today, in a world of so many different protocals for IM, both proprietary and FOSS, I trully believe in Matrix’s vision of a federated multi-support IM service. The compatibility with IRC has made it a truly recommendable program for most things and has allowed to completely uninstall my horrible IRC app. The possibility of the federation although problematic for complete privacy is a very good tool for the sustainability of the project, indeed it does not need for the official to pool in great amounts of revenue to keep the servers afloat or have the it die when the lead devs aren’t as interested by it anymore or don’t have the ressources/time to keep it sailing smoothly.
However, Matrix fails spectacularly at what actually matters for greater adoption: a clean, lightweight interface (web)app. I shall first start by thanking the devs that have created third party clients for Matrix because I just do not like the webapp. It’s honnestly fine. The desktop version however is just horrible for not-so-powerful computers (I would recommend nheko-reborn as cross-platform). The android app however, I must admit is much nicer, however it is a bit more than I need so I use the ‘minivector’ fork (available via f-droid).
To add to the dissapointing, yet encouraging, applications are the features. There is no doubt that to compete with a propritary application is quite challenging for any FLOSS project and yet the most basic features that make discord (or slack) great to use is not implemented (and does not seem to be in the roadmap?) in Matrix: rooms! I swear I think the mere creations of different rooms would make Matrix so much better. The audio/video is really, I think, secondary to the implementations of the most basic and advanced texting features. These have been for some time, I believe, become expected by most people/users.
And yet, despite these critiques, I shall keep using Matrix and look forward to it’s future because I dare express my optimism for it’s future sucess.

Matrix is a protocol for sending messages across the internet. Its main use is as an IM platform similar to WhatsApp and Telegram although it has other uses such as controlling IoT devices.

Pros:

• Federated/Decentralized: Matrix servers are decentralized in a similar way to email. Anyone can host their own server and talk to users across on other servers. This means there is absolutely no lock in and you are free to move to another server at any time without losing any of your contacts.

• Fully open source: The Matrix protocol and reference server and client software are licensed under libre licenses which ensures your freedom to use the software however you like

• Intercommunication with other protocols: matrix.org hosts bridges to other messaging services such as IRC, Gitter and Slack. This means you can talk to users who do not use Matrix, expanding the number of people you can talk to using Matrix.

• Great mobile support: There is a wonderful app for Matrix on Android and iOS called Riot

• Active development: There is a very active team of full time developers working on Matrix which listen to community feedback and are constantly adding more features.

Cons

• No feature complete native desktop clients: The reference client for matrix Riot is only available as a web app for desktop. While there are desktop clients under development which can be found on the matrix website; these clients are still lacking many of the features which riot supports.

• Still lacking some features from other IM platforms: Matrix clients while being completely usable for daily use are still lacking some desirable features however these features are quickly being added in.

In conclusion

Matrix is an exciting protocol which hopes to unite everyone together and break down walls for communication set up by proprietary solutions. Using Matrix with the Riot client is a very pleasant experience. With luck we may all be using this protocol to communicate and be done with issues of different contacts using different apps.