Everyone loves a comeback story.
Can a 20 year old overlooked technology make a comeback as a completely decentralized, free, and scalable technology for the growing masses of people who value freedom and privacy?
For me, blocking is one of the most important features any social app (chats, social media, etc) should have. I tried using Jabber to block my friend and had them message me from Xabber (from which I was entirely unable to block anyone), and their messages came through just fine. Months before that test, I had tried to test blocking someone else, but was unable to unblock them, even though all my clients said they weren’t blocked. I simply remained unable to message them, and the client kept telling me I had blocked their JID.
Could this have been an issue with the server I was using?
It’s possible that the implementation leaves something to be desired. Because I have used this feature so little myself, I will have to investigate to see what is truly going on and know how the server handles it vs. how the client handles it. I am currently using Converations on my phone with a Disroot account, and I have someone blocked. When I go into “Account details” I can open “Show block list” in the drop-down menu and they are still there. (As they should be, lol.) I can hold down on it and elect to unblock them. My understanding is that the server keeps this list and doesn’t allow messages directly from that JID to even be delivered to my client. I can also imagine some clients not being aware of this at all.
Even though I blocked their JID, it’s possible we both can be in the same MUC and I get messages from them through the MUC itself. I’m not sure if it’s possible to block that without help from the MUC’s admin.
Edit: One caveat here is that if you block individual JID’s, someone could create more JID’s with which to message you. Some XMPP servers have this behavior whereby they silently delete all incoming messages from people you haven’t added to your roster, so this “add-first” policy helps them keep out spam. Ideally you would be able to contact your server admin in cases of abuse if it would become necessary to block problematic servers or warn the admins of said servers of abuse.
Even though I blocked their JID, it’s possible we both can be in the same MUC and I get messages from them through the MUC itself. I’m not sure if it’s possible to block that without help from the MUC’s admin.
Yes that is not possible as only MUC admins actually know the real user JID (privacy feature), so a client can not know that the person in the MUC with the pseudonymous nick “marmulak” is the same user as the “marmulak@example.com” on your block-list.
For me, blocking is one of the most important features any social app (chats, social media, etc) should have. I tried using Jabber to block my friend and had them message me from Xabber (from which I was entirely unable to block anyone), and their messages came through just fine. Months before that test, I had tried to test blocking someone else, but was unable to unblock them, even though all my clients said they weren’t blocked. I simply remained unable to message them, and the client kept telling me I had blocked their JID.
Could this have been an issue with the server I was using?
It’s possible that the implementation leaves something to be desired. Because I have used this feature so little myself, I will have to investigate to see what is truly going on and know how the server handles it vs. how the client handles it. I am currently using Converations on my phone with a Disroot account, and I have someone blocked. When I go into “Account details” I can open “Show block list” in the drop-down menu and they are still there. (As they should be, lol.) I can hold down on it and elect to unblock them. My understanding is that the server keeps this list and doesn’t allow messages directly from that JID to even be delivered to my client. I can also imagine some clients not being aware of this at all.
Even though I blocked their JID, it’s possible we both can be in the same MUC and I get messages from them through the MUC itself. I’m not sure if it’s possible to block that without help from the MUC’s admin.
Edit: One caveat here is that if you block individual JID’s, someone could create more JID’s with which to message you. Some XMPP servers have this behavior whereby they silently delete all incoming messages from people you haven’t added to your roster, so this “add-first” policy helps them keep out spam. Ideally you would be able to contact your server admin in cases of abuse if it would become necessary to block problematic servers or warn the admins of said servers of abuse.
Yes that is not possible as only MUC admins actually know the real user JID (privacy feature), so a client can not know that the person in the MUC with the pseudonymous nick “marmulak” is the same user as the “marmulak@example.com” on your block-list.
What client were you testing? It’s worth a bugreport if the block feature didn’t work as expected