Matrix Space for chat communication

General talk
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Hallo together,

The space

There is a big space on the Matrix Protocol to collect lots of rooms. #osm-space:matrix.org (or a direct link: https://matrix.to/#/#osm-space:matrix.org)
What can you find there? Channels for various countries and channels(Rooms) for specialized stuff. Vegan. JOSM. Organic Maps. MapComplete. OSM Local Chapter Group. FOSSGIS, Magic Earth DE, HOT, OSMAnd, umap.

How do i get there?

Web-Application: Get on https://element.io/ and on the top right “Sign in” and then “Open Element web” if you don’t want to install an application
Desktop-Application: Get on https://element.io/ and on the top right “Get startet” and then “Download” and after opening Element you should get a prompt to register a new account.

On Element Desktop and Web there should be a Button on the top-left “Explore Rooms”
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If you enter there #osm-space:matrix.org you are able to join the space, a collection of rooms, directly. Otherwise you can look if there are rooms for. In this same room-exploration-windows you can enter #OpenStreetMap:matrix.org, the room, and join there.

Additional information

Whats matrix?

Matrix is a protocol and Element (https://element.io/) is one Client for this protocol. Think about E-Mail and Thunderbird, for example. There are other clients available as well, if you want to look around, but Element is the reference.

Bridging

So, why is this nice, because matrix can allow to bridge to other services. What does that mean? If a room is bridged, the users of service A can talk with the users of service B.
See the general room https://matrix.to/#/#_oftc_#osm:matrix.org for example - this room is bridged to the IRC-Channel #osm, so IRC can talk with Matrix.
There is second general OSM-Room as well available https://matrix.to/#/#OpenStreetMap:matrix.org but with much less users.(Room preview possible)

The whole OSM-World discord is bridged to matrix as well. There are rooms that are bridged to Telegram (like the local chapter room) and there are rooms that are bridged to Signal as far as i know.
Its possible to bridge with slack and other message services as well.

Working together

Bridging is nice, but it also means that sometimes we have to work together and sometimes that means constraints or limitations on what the matrix-people can or should do in an channel.

Another point is, its federated. So you can create an account on any matrix-server you can find and still communicate with every user from another matrix-server. If one server is down, the other servers in the room keep the room alive.

I’m around for quite some time now and there are really big rooms and usally everybody is quite helpfull.

If there is a room thats not in the space yet and you would like to see it included there, you can write here and i will include it.

Information about rooms and a starting point can be found in the wiki as well
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Matrix

Questions

  • Is the space official? No
  • Are the rooms in the space official? It is possible The space is just there to collect various rooms together. A room can be in multiple spaces at the same time.
  • Can everybody create a room? Yes

I will try to expand the questions section if more questions arise. Same, i will edit the post, if possible, if there is clarification needed.

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Can this forum bridge to Matrix?

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You can’t really bridge a a long(ish) form discussion and real time chat - they’re completely different things and it doesn’t make any sense.

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See this previous post - if you turn on the chat option here you can apparently link to Matrix.

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Possibly: Matrix protocol for chat - feature - Discourse Meta, but as @TomH says, it’s probably not suited for a direct bridge.

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Discourse itself is not possible, but its possible to subscribe with the RSS widget to a feed like a specific thread or a forum like the local community. And a integration to subscribe threads is there as well.

Whats possible to bridge can be seen here Matrix.org - Bridges but bear in mind, there needs to be a service offering the bridge as well. These bridges can be set up and provided by anyone. A service that offers Telegram and Discord really reliable is https://www.t2host.io/ for example. Natively integrated into element as of now is Slack, IRC (Snoonet, OFTC, W3C).

And 2 bots, one is for RSS Feeds, the second one to connect to github (issues can be created directly from chat for example, new issues get a post in the channel and so on).

Element is currently integrating a “position” feature into element and its using OSM as well. Compared to Signal thats using google again :frowning:

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That sounds like a complicated no to me!

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Sorry i made it seem complicated. Its basically the same as every other chat. Get on https://element.io/ and on the top right “Sign in” and then “Open Element web” if you don’t want to install an application or if you prefer an application “Get startet” and then “Download”.

With web, you can then register a new account and then it should work. The first room you enter should be #osm-space:matrix.org as there are a lof of rooms collected.

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You likely mean discourse, right?

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No not likely, there is a large group of people that propagate using Discord for OSM purposes. While I wouldn’t support bridging their main channel in to other non-proprietary service based ones (leaving aside the whole issue of control), there is no harm in making it accessible in matrix (which is already the case).

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There was indeed a mistake which was fixed in an edit of their post. Oops my quote lacked context so it was ambigous with the latter and legit occurence of “Discord”

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