Hacker News Reader

Hi there, Signal Android developer here. I'm sorry if you've had any sort of negative interaction with Signal in the past. I would personally never dismiss anyone's feedback on the grounds that this is a free app (the linked post was written by a very kind community member, not a Signal employee, but I also don't believe they were being dismissive either). Given that Signal has no metrics, feedback provided online is one of the only tools we have to know if we're working on the right things.

That being said, we do have a lot of feedback to comb through every day, so if you don't get response (or get a short one), the intention is not malicious -- it's sometimes just a result of having too much to read and too little time. But we truly do read nearly everything (particularly on Github), even if we don't have a comment on everything. I hope you continue to provide feedback!

Hello, thank you for your comment and for your work on Signal.

I wrote a comment here outlining my frustration over the lack of export ability in iOS: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25763997

I feel this goes beyond simply not providing a "feature", but rather it is actively harmful to users, especially in combination with unreliable mobile/desktop sync. It means that people get their memories destroyed, without warning and without recourse.

Would you be willing to have a conversation with me over email (address in profile)? I would like to discuss what can be done about this, and I would be open to compensating developers for their time.

https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Ba...

Yes, unfortunately this is inadequate. Note that only transfers to other iOS devices are supported, and also “your old device will delete your message history after the transfer is complete”.

Hi. Thanks for your work. How can I leave UX feedback? Because honestly, it's pretty bad.

I've read similar sentiments before. After reading between the lines it's often clear that the developers have not brushed aside a concern or ignored a request. Sometimes they've actually explained their side, but a user has not bothered searching and reading forum history, they've simply sprayed their keyboard into a text box with unreasonable and rude remarks.

If I get a terse reply that says "We know this is a pain point, we're working on it!" then I take that in good faith and leave it be. But some find any reply an excuse to fuel their ranting.

There are definitely some areas, particularly those of principles, where the foundation makes a hard line clear. Even if this goes against what I think is best, I respect their clear message that this is their stance and it's staying.

Lastly I feel your remark that the team could be nicer is flagrantly unfounded. I have never come across any user being treated unkindly and without the attention one can expect from such a skewed user:resource ratio. I'm dismayed you've taken something I wrote for good and blemished it with an unfounded reprisal.

The two biggest issues with Signal have been

a) Using SGX (brushed aside) b) Inability to export and backup chats (ignored)

I also am extremely frustrated by the inability to export and backup chats. In combination with mobile/desktop sync problems, it means that I have lots of personal memories on one device, with no way to get them off and protect them.

There was no warning when I first installed Signal that the usual phone backup mechanism (via iTunes, in my case) would not backup this data, or that mobile/desktop syncing problems might mean that hundreds of messages just don't get synced to my other devices, and that this is expected behavior.

So I'm angry, and I can't recommend Signal to others for this reason. And the devs just don't seem to care.

I appreciate that it's an open-source project, and the developers have no obligation to develop new features. But this isn't really a feature request; certain sharp edges in a product are actively destructive if you don't warn the user about them. It's like someone handing out free food which turns out to be poisonous, and then saying, "What are you all complaining about? The food is free!"

If any Signal developer sees this, I would personally be happy to have a discussion about compensating you for your time to fix this problem for the community. My email address is in my profile.

> So I'm angry, and I can't recommend Signal to others for this reason. And the devs just don't seem to care.

Could have just been: "I can't recommend Signal to others for this reason."

I read the "Please be nice" post as a request to leave out the part about being angry or assuming that the devs don't care. It is understandable that you feel that way, but saying so doesn't fix your issue. It does make other people feel bad.

I guess I’m just saying I don’t think it’s a reasonable request, and this was my way of politely explaining why. It’s okay for users to express anger over something like this. The fact that devs are doing volunteer work is great, but it doesn’t exempt them from certain responsibilities (see my food analogy).

b/ https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007059752-Ba... Don't know to what extent you can export, but you can at least make backups

If you have an Android phone, yes, I suppose you can backup. But I don't.

There's no backup procedure for iOS. There's a migration, but the phone you're migrating from has to be working at the time. So if it's destroyed, you're SOL. Also, it's really buggy and has never worked every time I've seen it attempted.

The desktop instructions do not describe a backup. If you try to copy your old data over to a new machine in an attempt to preserve your chat history, you will break things. The procedure doesn't describe how to make things work, but rather how to unhose things once Signal has prevented you from doing what you want and blown up in your face to punish you. There is a way to export from the Desktop client, but it involves using sqlcipher and is an undocumented, unsupported, discouraged hack.

I often find myself thinking the same about other projects.

A good example is Nextcloud, who keeps growing its feature list, but never implements any of them properly. It's a fair line of questioning when your Nextcloud install borked itself for the third time in a year, and Android synchronisation doesn't work reliably.

> Signal could do a lot better in connecting with the community of users who care to connect. Remember that the users have a stake in this, so dismissing their feedback as “this is free, don’t ask for more” is actually condescending. Without users and users who evangelize the product in their circles, no such project can expand or thrive.

> Signal team, you could also practice being nicer and more attentive.

I've been interacting with Signal and observing Signal interacting with people for several years now and I have observed the opposite of what you're saying here. They are nice, they are attentive, and they do a great job of connecting with their community. They don't always do what I ask, and that's OK.

I will be a little provocative even, and say that you're deliberately misrepresenting what has been said in their post (dismissing their feedback as “this is free, don’t ask for more” is actually condescending) - that's bad faith, and maybe their post is aimed at you. It will be beneficial if you attempt to separate the emotion and try rereading what they have said.