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Comment by lxgr

8 days ago

Very nice! Could this be published in the App Store, or does it use any APIs Apple considers off-limits?

I'm regularly frustrated by modern phone's complete inabilities to allow any communication when outside of mobile network or Wi-Fi coverage, not even within the two large walled gardens.

It would be so easy for Apple to extend iMessage to work peer-to-peer, at least between people that have already messaged each other before and while both screens are on. That's literally how AirDrop works, and having to send a "Notes" text back and forth is just silly.

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lxgr

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apetresc  8 days ago

Legit curious what the use case would be, that would justify Apple adding it in. Like, when do you need to text someone who's within Bluetooth range but somehow has no WiFi or cell reception?

  • __MatrixMan__  8 days ago

    When you're at a protest and the government shuts off the internet in response to the protest. It's happening right now in Togo, has been for ten days (https://pulse.internetsociety.org/en/shutdowns/).

    • Buttons840  8 days ago

      My eyes are opened as to how much more power the people would have if cell phones were all mesh network devices, especially as we enter a world where having a working cell phone is easier than having running water or food.

      1 reply →

    • apetresc  6 days ago

      I dunno, that still sounds like a perfect use case for a third-party app like the one this post is about. I'm not sure government crackdowns are a core enough experience that it needs a first-party app from Apple.

      2 replies →

  • ileonichwiesz  8 days ago

    This is admittedly a rare and minor use case, but maybe on a plane if you’re not sitting next to each other? Last time I flew I saw two teenage girls communicating by typing into the same note file and Airdropping it back and forth for hours - it struck me as very silly that there was no messaging interface that they could use instead.

  • reaperducer  8 days ago

    when do you need to text someone who's within Bluetooth range but somehow has no WiFi or cell reception?

    There's no cell service or wifi at my neighborhood movie theater. If I could send her a message when she's up, I could tell my wife to bring me back a box of Sno-caps.

  • c22  8 days ago

    When would you want to peer over third party networks while a direct connection is possible?

  • vishnugupta  8 days ago

    Hiking, Airplane, stadia (here in India the tower capacity get exhausted), underground metro etc

    • subscribed  8 days ago

      Hiking? Probably not very useful since you must be within Bluetooth range and you can whisper to your chat partner.

      If you're hiking in the remote area youre much better off with LoRaWAN or amateur radio transceivers anyway.

      2 replies →

  • dewey  8 days ago

    On top of that “It would be so easy” is almost never true for a billion users network with all kinds of edge cases. Seems like a very narrow use case when there’s things missing from iMessage that could be way more appealing for a bigger group of users.

    • lxgr  8 days ago

      I’d agree if Airdrop, which includes offline identification via users’ address books, didn’t already exist. That seems to be by far the hardest part.

      2 replies →

  • immibis  6 days ago

    This happens at festivals - despite being largely offline events, you still want to text your friends "hey I'm over at <place>", but the one rural cell that's usually empty for 362 days out of the year is getting DDoSed by 50000 people suddenly arriving one weekend.

trklausss  8 days ago

Looks like it, at least on the README, section "Building for Production" mentions it.

I'm a bit more concerned that it is a niche application. Not having Mac myself, can't compile it without going through the hassle of getting the environment running.

It would be better if the application was built is something a bit more cross-platform, as I find the idea really good. Not sure if the "mesh network" part would work though, as you need a really high enrolled-device density in order for it to work further than just an office (it's BT after all). I guess the "Fork" button is there for a reason, or maybe a new repo with some other stack.

dzhiurgis  8 days ago

I'd much rather Apple allow running something like this (open source) myself rather than use their "just trust me bro" store.

  • OsrsNeedsf2P  8 days ago

    I've never understood this argument. Apple spends billions of dollars vetting their store for high quality apps. You can't even verify the build you get off Github was compiled from the same posted source.

    As much as people want to be "leet" and run 3rd party software, it's inherently insecure and that's why Apple shuts it down.

    • thejazzman  8 days ago

      They shut it down because 30%.

      There was a version of Apple at a point in time where I agree with your rhetoric. They have completely lost credibility to uphold that position IMO.

      Apple definitely does not spend billions guaranteeing "quality". To prove my point, where does Apple even define what they consider "quality"? How can you quantify such an aubjecrive and ambiguous term?

      They spend billions paying out the 70% they don't pocket.

      Heck, They don't even adhere to their own HIG nor let us revert to past (objectively higher quality) versions of iOS.

      5 replies →

    • __MatrixMan__  8 days ago

      > You can't even verify the build you get off Github was compiled from the same posted source

      Sure you can: build it and check the hash. If the maintainer prepared for such a check ahead of time it can be as simple as:

          wget https://github.com/owner/foo-project/releases/download/.../foo
    sha256sum foo                       # make note of this 
    nix build github:owner/foo-project
    sha256sum result/bin/foo            # it should match this

      A pinky promise from a corporation can never be more trustworthy than something that we can all verify locally.

      Of course there's still the should-you-trust-this-code part of the problem, but at least bad guys in that case must operate in public view, which is--once again--a stronger deterrent to shenanigans than anything that happens behind closed doors at Apple.

      1 reply →

    • noman-land  8 days ago

      This might sound crazy but some people want the freedom to use their belongings however they want instead of having artificial child locks placed on them by trillion dollar corporate daddies.

      4 replies →

    • aguacaterojo  8 days ago

      > You can't even verify the build you get off Github was compiled from the same posted source.

      You don't need to because you compile it from source yourself

    • dzhiurgis  8 days ago

      You obviously build it yourself.

      IMO ultimate solution is for Apple to curate some sort open source store where they vet the source and builds "in public".

    • TiredOfLife  8 days ago

      > Apple spends billions of dollars vetting their store for high quality apps.

      Rofl. And citation needed.