1#Conversations
2Conversations is an open source XMPP (formerly known as Jabber) client for
3Android 4.0+ smart phones.
4[](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.siacs.conversations)
5
6
7
8##Design principles
9* Be as beautiful and easy to use as possible without sacrificing security or
10 privacy
11* Rely on existing, well established protocols
12* Do not require a Google Account or specifically Google Cloud Messaging (GCM)
13* Require as little permissons as possible
14
15##Features
16* End-to-end encryption with either OTR or openPGP
17* Sending and receiving images
18* Holo UI
19* Syncs with your desktop client
20* Group Chats
21* Address book integration
22* Multiple Accounts / unified inbox
23
24###XMPP Features
25Conversations works with every XMPP server out there. However XMPP is an extensible
26protocol. These extensions are standardized as well in so called XEP’s.
27Conversations supports a couple of those to make the overall userexperience better. There is a
28chance that your current XMPP server does not support these extensions.
29Therefore to get the most out of Conversations you should consider either switching to an
30XMPP server that does or - even better - run your own XMPP server for you and
31your friends.
32These XEPs are - as of now:
33* XEP-0065: SOCKS5 Bytestreams - or rather mod_proxy65. Will be used to tranfer files if both parties are behind a firewall (NAT).
34* XEP-0138: Stream Compression saves bandwith
35* XEP-0198: Stream Management allows XMPP to surive small network outages and changes of the underlying TCP connection.
36* XEP-0280: Message Carbons which automatically syncs the messages you send to
37 your desktop client and thus allows you to switch seamlessly from your mobile
38 client to your desktop client and back within one conversation.
39* XEP-0237: Roster Versioning mainly to save bandwith on poor mobile connections
40
41##Contributors
42(In order of appearance)
43
44###Code
45* [Rene Treffer](https://github.com/rtreffer)
46* [Andreas Straub](https://github.com/strb)
47* [Alethea Butler](https://github.com/alethea)
48
49###Logo
50* [Diego Turtulici](http://efesto.eigenlab.org/~diesys)
51
52###Translations
53* [Sergio Cárdenas](https://github.com/kruks23) (Spanish)
54* [Benoit Bouvarel](https://github.com/BenoitBouvarel) (French)
55* [Daniel Gultsch](https://github.com/iNPUTmice) (German)
56* [Aitor Beriain](https://github.com/beriain) (Basque)
57* [Ilia Rostovtsev](https://github.com/rostovtsev) (Russian)
58
59##FAQ
60###General
61####How do I install Conversations?
62Conversations is entirely open source and licensed under GPLv3. So if you are a
63software developer you can check out the sources from github and use ant to
64build your apk file.
65
66The more convenient way - which not only gives you automatic updates but also
67supports the further development of Conversations - is to buy the App in the Google
68[Play Store](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.siacs.conversations).
69####I don't have a Google Account but I would still like to make a contribution
70I accept donations over PayPal and BitCoin. For donations via PayPal you can use the email address donate@siacs.eu or the button below.
71
72[](https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=CW3SYT3KG5PDL)
73
74**Disclaimer:** I'm not a huge fan of PayPal and their business policies. For larger
75contributons please get in touch with me beforehand and we can talk about bank
76transfer (SEPA).
77
78My Bitcoin Address is: 1NxSU1YxYzJVDpX1rcESAA3NJki7kRgeeu
79
80####How do I create an account?
81XMPP like email for example is a federated protocol which means that there is
82not one company you can create your 'official xmpp account' with but there are
83hundreds or even thousands of provider out there. To find one use a web search
84engine of your choice. Or maybe your univeristy has one. Or you can run your own.
85Or ask a friend to run one. Once you found one you can use Conversations to
86create an account. Just select 'register new account on server' within the
87create account dialog.
88
89####Conversations dosen't work for me. Where can I get help?
90You can join our conference room on conversations@conference.siacs.eu A lot of
91people in there are able to answer basic questions about the usage of
92Conversations or can provide you with tips on running your own XMPP server. If
93you found a bug or your app crashes please read the Developer / Report Bugs
94section of this document.
95
96####I need professional support with Conversations or setting up my server
97I'm available for hire. Contact me at inputmice@siacs.eu
98
99####How does the address book integration work?
100The address bock integration was designed to protect your privacy. Conversations
101neither uploads contacts from your address book to your server nor fills your
102address book with unnecessary contacts from your online roster. If you manually
103add a Jabber ID to your phones address book Conversations will use the name and
104the profile picture of this contact. To make the process of adding Jabber IDs to
105your address book easier you can click on the profile picture in the contact
106detais within Conversations. This will start an add to address book intent with the jabber ID
107as payload. This doesn’t require Conversations to have write permissions on your
108address book but also doesn’t require you to copy past Jabber ID from one app to
109another.
110####Where can I see the status of my contacts? How can I set a status or priority
111Status are a horrible metric. Setting them manually to a proper value rarly
112works because users are either lazy or just forget about them. Setting them
113automatically does not provide quality results either. Keyboard or mouse
114activity as indicator for example fails when the users is just looking at
115something (reading an article, watching a movie). Furthermore automatic setting
116of status always implies an impact on your privacy. (Are you sure you want
117everybody in your contact list to know that you have been using your computer at
1184am?!)
119
120In the past status has been used to judge the likelihood of whether or not your
121messages are being read. This is no longer necessary. With Chat Markers
122(XEP-0333, supported by Conversations since 0.4) we have the ability to **know**
123whether or not your messages are being read.
124Similar things can be said for priorites. In the past priorties have been used
125(By servers, not by clients!) to route your messages to one specific client.
126With carbon messages (XEP-0280, supported by Conversations since 0.1) this is no
127longer necessary. Using priorities to route OTR messages isn't pratical either
128because they are not changeable on the fly. Metrics like last active client
129(the client which sent the last message) are much better.
130
131Unfortunatly these modern replacement for legacy XMPP featurs are not widely
132adopted. However Conversations should be an instant messanger for the future and
133instead of making Conversations compatible with the past we should work on
134implementing new, improved technologies into other XMPP clients as well.
135
136Making these status and priority optional isn't a solution either because
137Conversations is trying to get rid of old behaviours and set an example for
138other clients.
139
140####Conversations is missing a certain feature
141I'm open for new feature suggestions. You can use the issue tracker on github.
142Please take some time to browse through the issues to see if someone else
143already suggested it. Be assured that I read each and every ticket. If I like it
144I will leave it open untill it's implemented. If I don't like it I will close
145it. (Usually with a short comment). If I don't comment on an feature request
146thats probably a good sign because this means I agree with you. Commenting with
147+1 on either open or closed issues wont change my mind nor will it accelerate the
148development.
149
150####You closed my feature request but I want it really really badly
151Just write it yourself and send my a pull request. If I like it I will happily
152merge it if I don't at least you and like minded people get to enjoy it.
153
154####I need a feature and I need it now!
155I am available for hire. Contact me JID: inputmice@siacs.eu
156
157###Security
158####Why are there two end-to-end encryption methods and which one should I choose?
159In most cases OTR should be the encryption method of choice. It works out of the box with most contacts as long as they are online.
160However PGP can be in some cases (carbonated messages to multiple clients) be
161more flexible.
162####How do I use openPGP
163Before you continue reading you should notice that the openPGP support in
164Conversations is marked as experimental. This is not because it will make the app
165unstable but because the fundamental concepts of PGP aren't ready for a
166widespread use. The way PGP works is that you trust Key IDs instead of XMPP- or email addresses. So in theory your contact list should consist of Public-Key-IDs instead of email addresses. But of course no email or xmpp client out there implements these concepts. Plus PGP in the context of instant messaging has a couple of downsides. It is vulnerable to replay attacks, it is rather verbose, and decryping and encrypting takes longer than OTR. It is however asynchronous and works well with carbonated messages.
167
168To use openpgp you have to install the opensource app OpenKeychain (www.openkeychain.org) and then long press on the account in manage accounts and choose renew PGP announcement from the contextual menu.
169####How does the encryption for conferences work?
170For conferences the only supported encryption method is OpenPGP. (OTR does not
171work with multiple participents.) Every participant has to announce their
172OpenPGP key. (See answer above). If you would like to send encrypted messages to
173a conference you have to make sure that you have every participants public key
174in your OpenKeychain. Right now there is no check in Conversations to ensure
175that. You have to take care of that yourself. Go to the conference details and
176touch every key id (The hexadecimal number below a contact). This will send you
177to OpenKeychain which will assist you on adding the key.
178This works best in very small conferences with contacts you are already using
179OpenPGP with. This feature is regarded experimental. Conversations is the only
180client that uses XEP-0027 with confercenes. (The XEP neither specifically allows
181nor disallows this.)
182###Development
183####How do I build Conversations
184Make sure to have ANDROID_HOME point to your Android SDK
185```
186git clone https://github.com/siacs/Conversations.git
187cd Conversations
188git submodule update --init --recursive
189ant clean
190ant debug
191```
192####I found a bug
193Please report it to our issue tracker. If your app crashes please provide a
194stack trace. If you are experiencing missbehaviour please provide detailed
195steps to reproduce.
196Always mention whether you are running the latest Play Store version or the
197current HEAD.