I have been auto posting Monal updates to twitter for a while. If you do not use twitter and use reddit, you may want to join the new Monal subreddit. Ideally this would be easier to follow than a twitter thread and a place to discuss Monal issues and enhancements

The next beta for Mac has been released. This adds the ability to send location from the attachment button and bring it to feature parity with iOS. Barring any last minute issues this will be the version send to apple for release.

The Mac signing issues with Xcode 12 have been resolved. The beta has been updated. We are also really proud to note that Monal support Apple Silicon from this build onwards. If there are any users with M1 powered Macs, please let us know how it is. The App Store release will be delayed for a few days as Apple gives their employees the holidays off. Expect the update around the new year.

This is a large update with many changes under the hood

• complete rewrite of internal xmpp parser
• complete overhaul of OMEMO including many bug fixes and improvements
• improved error handling in encryption code
• added floating “scroll to bottom”-button
• added notification privacy setting UI
• added the “/me”-command
• added support for roster names instead of jid
• added support for XEP-0333 char-markers including synchronization of message read state across devices (this will even remove notifications for messages read on another device)
• implemented last message correction and blabber.im-style message deletion (using LMC)
• implemented ui to set own status message and display status messages of contacts in contact-details
• implemented modern swipe action UI for messages
• implemented XEP-0172 nicknames (set own nickname, read other nicknames)
• implemented XEP-0084 user avatar including new ui to set own avatar
• rewrote complete image/file transfer code
• removed ancient online/offline distinction for contacts
• now showing privacy settings after first account setup and on first app start
• updated localizations
• added notification actions to reply or mark as read directly from notification without opening the app
• improved chat scrolling
• fixed issues with image transfers only showing a grey rectangle
• fixed ios 12 crash when uploading big OMEMO encrypted images
• improved UI

I have filled up the new App Store Nutrition Label for the next release. In case there is any doubt about how Monal works, there is zero data collected by the developers or any third party. Whatever you do with Monal is between you, your server and the person you are talking to.

We are happy to announce Smack 4.4.0 , which is the first major release since the release of Smack 4.3.0 in August 2018. Smack 4.4.0 includes many new features, bug fixes, and improvements. The Smack 4.4.0 release artifacts are now available on Maven Central .

Smack is a community effort and would not be possible without plenty of contributors. We like to thank everyone who contributed to this release:

$ git shortlog -sn 4.3.0..4.4.0   813  Florian Schmaus    78  Paul Schaub    27  Aditya Borikar     7  Georg Lukas     7  Guus der Kinderen     4  Benjamin JALON     2  Damian Minkov     2  Jesus Fuentes     2  Oliver Mihatsch     2  Simon Schuster     1  Alameyo     1  Andrey Sokolov     1  Bastien Rouiller     1  Daryl E. Herzmann     1  Eng ChongMeng     1  Greg Thomas     1  Heckel     1  John Haubrich     1  Marcel Heckel     1  Matthew Wild     1  Miguel Hincapie     1  Mohsen Hariri     1  Piotr Nosek     1  Tairs Rzajevs     1  V Lau     1  spslinger

The release of Smack 4.4.0 also means that Smack 4.3 does no longer receive bug fixes as part of the community effort. However, it is possible to reach out to professional services in case of issues with Smack 4.3.

Please refer to the release’s README for more information about Smack 4.4

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For some time XMPP has been in need of a good solution for Apple’s mobile operating system,iOS. In 2020 we now have a number of active projects. Work on the long-standing iOS (and nowalso MacOS) client Monal IM has really picked up in recent months, in no small part thanksto the efforts of tmolitor , who has beencontributing a lot of modernization to both the UI and the internals.

Tigase also released an open-source iOS client, Siskin IM that has been making steady progress recently .

Monal IM

Siskin IM

It’s exciting to see so much activity happening around XMPP on iOS now, and both projectsare adding more modern XMPP features with every release. Snikket does not currently havean official iOS client, so we’ve obviously been keeping a close eye on these advancements.

A major interoperability problem between the current version of Siskin and other modern XMPPclients is that it does not support end-to-end encryption (OMEMO) in group chats. This meansthat users of Siskin cannot participate in private group chats started by Conversations orthe Snikket client on Android, because they are end-to-end encrypted by default.

OMEMO is a form of “end-to-end encryption”, which meansthat it hides message contents from the servers and operators of each chat participant. Siskinalready supports OMEMO for one-to-one conversations, but not group conversations.

One of the goals of Snikket’s CIC is supporting and advancing theXMPP ecosystem. With that in mind, we’ve been working in recent months to obtain fundingto close this gap in Siskin. Today we are pleased to announce that thanks to a private donor,the project can now move forward. The Tigase team will commence work on OMEMO in MUC in thecoming weeks!

This is really exciting news, and will bring the XMPP experience for iOS users an importantstep closer to that of other platforms. There will be more announcements in the future, staytuned!

If you want to help us with our goals and other projects like this,consider a donation , contribute in some other way ,or simply help spread the word! The future of XMPP is coming :)

While I work out issues with Xcode 12, I have released a Monal 4.9 build for Mac using Xcode 11. I hope to have an arm native build as soon as the code signing issues in Xcode are resolved. I am talking to Apple about it.

iOS 4.9 beta has been out for a week or so. The mac beta is on its way. I would like this will support the new M1 processors if possible. I am running into some issues with signing on Xcode 12 that is blocking it at the moment