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)
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.
By chance do you happen to use Revolt? If so, do you (or @Takeshidude@lemmy.world) know which client might be good to use?
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).
I did try it, but it was missing video streaming last I checked. Also, they made self hosting without docker incredibly difficult.
may I ask why you’d prefer setting things up manually without docker?
Imho, copy & pasting a provided docker-compose is much simpler.
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.
An app that expects to be widely distributed and used but is Docker exclusive failed before even starting.
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.
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?
Jumping from one proprietary system to another isn’t really an improvement.
At least you have control over your data and you and your friends can blame you for server crashes lol.
I didn’t realize it was possible to host your own backend locally… I thought it was just hosting the webUI locally.
