reliable battery friendly. With built-in support for images group
chats and e2e encryption.
Design principles
• Be as beautiful and easy to use as possible without sacrificing
security or privacy
• Rely on existing well established protocols
• Do not require a Google Account or specifically Google Cloud
Messaging (GCM)
• Require as little permissions as possible
Features
• End-to-end encryption with either OMEMO or OpenPGP
• Encrypted audio and video calls (DLTS-SRTP)
• Sending and receiving images
• Intuitive UI that follows Android Design guidelines
• Pictures / Avatars for your Contacts
• Syncs with desktop client
• Conferences (with support for bookmarks)
• Address book integration
• Multiple Accounts / unified inbox
• Very low impact on battery life
XMPP Features
Conversations works with every XMPP server out there. However XMPP
is an extensible protocol. These extensions are standardized as
well in so called XEP’s. Conversations supports a couple of those
to make the overall user experience better. There is a chance that
your current XMPP server does not support these extensions.
Therefore to get the most out of Conversations you should consider
either switching to an
XMPP server that does or – even better – run your own XMPP server
for you and your friends.
These XEPs are – as of now:
• XEP-0065: SOCKS5 Bytestreams (or mod_proxy65). Will be used to
transfer files if both parties are behind a firewall (NAT).
• XEP-0163: Personal Eventing Protocol for avatars
• XEP-0191: Blocking command lets you blacklist spammers or block
contacts without removing them from your roster.
• XEP-0198: Stream Management allows XMPP to survive small network
outages and changes of the underlying TCP connection.
• XEP-0280: Message Carbons which automatically syncs the messages
you send to your desktop client and thus allows you to switch
seamlessly from your mobile client to your desktop client and back
within one conversation.
• XEP-0237: Roster Versioning mainly to save bandwidth on poor
mobile connections
• XEP-0313: Message Archive Management synchronize message history
with the server. Catch up with messages that were sent while
Conversations was offline.
• XEP-0352: Client State Indication lets the server know whether or
not Conversations is in the background. Allows the server to save
bandwidth by withholding unimportant packages.
• XEP-0363: HTTP File Upload allows you to share files in
conferences and with offline contacts. Requires an additional
component on your server.