What does HackerNews think of Telegram-FOSS?

There is an unofficial FOSS version. I'm not sure if it is feature complete, secure, etc.

https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

... and Telegram FOSS [1] fixes all of the mentioned points?

[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

For people that are not aware: There's a Telegram FOSS [1] fork which contains all kinds of fixes; and additionally is Google Services and tracking free, which means it will run on AOSP and LineageOS without any burden of push services.

You can verify this yourself with AppWarden [2].

[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

[2] https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AppWarden

I wouldn't call it helplessly outdated, at most it's a version behind. But there's a number of reasons for this. For starters Telegram themselves lag behind in releasing the source code for the app[1]. Then the volunteers who make the FOSS version[2] have to update their fork and make sure it works. Then finally it's submitted to F-Droid, where it's compiled by their build servers (of which the build process occasionally breaks and needs to be fixed).

I think the assurances that this offers (entirely FOSS, reproducible builds, better privacy and security[3]) outweighs being sometimes days or weeks behind the releases they upload to the Google Play Store.

[1] https://github.com/DrKLO/Telegram [2] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS [3] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS#changes

> Commits are useless (one commit per release)

FTR Telegram is released in a similar fashion: https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

They do have releases more often than Threema though which means the commits are smaller.

I kinda agree with the sentiment in the articles from an AOSP/lineage/cyanogen perspective.

They should definitely embrace the Telegram FOSS fork [1] and OSMAnd~ [2] (which is a superb offline navigation tool btw) and remove all Apps that require the Android 10 firebase hockey-based notifications. [5] and [6]

A lot of apps use this for convenience and because it was _required_ since AOSP 10 but there are ways to work around that requirement with a high priority notification.

I would additionally recommend to use AppWarden [3] and Blokada [4], because both are amazing additions for an Android device.

Firefox for Android, though, is still a nightmare with all the telemetry. The old TOR Browser 9.5 series is based on old Firefox pre-quantum, 10 is based on Firefox post-quantum.

The issue with current Firefox and TOR Browser is that Mozilla decided to include the Adjust-, Firebase- and LeanPlum-SDK which introduce now more user tracking than ever before. You'll even sometimes see different A/B UIs based on your browsing behavior (not kidding) and geolocation, and of course this happens more often with Orbot being used as a Proxy.

(You can verify this via AppWarden if you don't trust me)

[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

[2] https://github.com/osmandapp/OsmAnd

[3] https://gitlab.com/AuroraOSS/AppWarden/

[4] https://github.com/blokadaorg

[5] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS/blob/mas...

[6] https://developer.android.com/guide/components/activities/ba...

The Telegram FOSS fork also is g-services and telemetry/firebase free (you can verify this with AppWarden). [1]

[1] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

This package [1] on f-droid is built directly of the source on github [2]. Even if the source is old so is the package. F-droid compiles this package not telegram.

I wrote the peertube client Throium which is also available on f-droid [3]. When I Tag a new release on github, f-droid will build the package automatically and publish it the next day. I do not build the packages for f-droid.

[1] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/org.telegram.messenger/

[2] https://github.com/Telegram-FOSS-Team/Telegram-FOSS

[3] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/net.schueller.peertube/