[zinid]

> It's quite subjective, but my view is Matrix is what XMPP would like if it was written today.

That's indeed a subjective view.

> The main advantages are it is using JSON instead of XML, and HTTP instead of custom protocols

The Matrix dev said a day ago that "It's NOTHING to do with HTTP+JSON": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19217412

Also, what custom protocol are you talking about? XMPP works on top of TCP/TLS (or Websocket). Those are the IETF standards. In fact XMPP doesn't require an additional layer of HTTP at all.

> with lightweight mobile clients

Where are they? Anything even remotely comparable battery-wise with Conversations (an XMPP client)?

Not to mention that Matrix has a terrible server implementation which requires several GB of RAM just to join matrix.org room.

> It also has a lot built into the core protocol, where as to get XMPP to do anything useful you will need to use a lot of extensions (and ensure the server and all clients support them).

I fail to see how having a monolith core versus splitted specs has to do anything with code written to support that. Of course, initially every implementation will strive to implement full core (that was in XMPP in 2000s), but when the core evolves you have absolutely no guarantee that every developer will implement all new parts of the core. How is that addressed in Matrix?

[allende12]

> How is that addressed in Matrix?

Well that's quite easy, since hosting a server is a resource hog, most people are still on matrix.org, which gives it a special status in the ecosystem (even more special than jabber.org has been in the early 2000s fox XMPP). This allows them to "move fast and break stuff" on short notice (a few months), to bring the protocol forward and force people to upgrade. In the federated XMPP ecosystem, they essentially have to come to a community consensus between developers, servers operators and all other relevant actors to write a manifesto or a new spec that says "stop using $thing at $date".

In my opinion matrix, while being open-source, federated and easy to write clients for, is still a half-locked platform because essentially the matrix.org server is "too big to fail", and the matrix team is the only one who can e.g. offer consultancy over the protocol because nobody else can have a long-term view of its future evolutions (of course the matrix people are nice, and you can discuss with them, but that is still not a standards body).

[zinid]

> is still a half-locked platform... but that is still not a standards body

Exactly. That's why I always stress the importance of the IETF. The whole point of the IETF is that you cooperate with people, deal with opposite opinions, accept criticism, come to agreement, develop a compromise and produce a high quality absurdly documented standard. In Matrix bubble (and any others, see cryptocurrency or p2p community for example) they are the only one who makes the decision. They don't care on other opinions. If you disagree with them you're asked to stop "fighting", "focus on interaction", "understand their goals" and other meaningless stuff like "let the best standard wins" (when in reality the whole point of the standard is to cooperate). Formally speaking they try to substitute a "standard document" with an "open document" and people kinda swallow this because they don't see the difference.

[Arathorn]

this is categorically not true.

> In Matrix bubble (and any others, see cryptocurrency or p2p community for example) they are the only one who makes the decision. They don't care on other opinions.

You can see our governance model at https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/blob/matthew/msc177... and see that we do everything we can to ensure that the wider community can contribute to the spec and steer it in the right direction.

And fwiw, we'd be perfectly happy to contribute the spec to IETF or W3C or whoever once it's relatively stable, just like XMPP did.

Rather than burning all this energy spreading FUD about Matrix, perhaps it might be better spent improving XMPP? :/

[zinid]

> Rather than burning all this energy spreading FUD about Matrix, perhaps it might be better spent improving XMPP? :/

Yeah, didn't I say above about such kind of arguments?

[zinid]

> You can see our governance model at https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/blob/matthew/msc177.... and see that we do everything we can to ensure that the wider community can contribute to the spec and steer it in the right direction... And fwiw, we'd be perfectly happy to contribute the spec to IETF or W3C or whoever once it's relatively stable, just like XMPP did.

I'm not a lawyer to read such documents. Just "contribute" your core to the IETF, prove me wrong.

[cvwright]

That's when committees and standards bodies work well.

When they don't, you get OAUTH2.

https://hueniverse.com/oauth-2-0-and-the-road-to-hell-8eec45...