So I use Signal, I just installed Sailfish on a new device.
Because I use Uber (and other apps) I have configured MicroG on the device.
I first tried installing the native Sailfish version of Signal instead - but the device registration is broken using the Sailfish app.
So I can’t use it.
As a last resort I then went to Signal’s own website and direct downloaded an APK, which has a software built that will use a WebSocket (I think) and will work.
Success
So… If you are trying to get Signal working on Sailfish, and everything else down’t work, try the link above, it worked for me
There is also Molly, a fork of the official Signal client including some privacy-related improvements which may be of interest to some in the SFOS community. It works fine under AAS and can be easily installed from F-Droid which will also serve you the regular updates to the app.
Similar here, though I always install the Signal Android app straight from their website. It does NOT require MicroG or any proprietary Google stuff, and works really well on SFOS.
Molly even provides a FOSS version specifically to be without proprietary Google stuff, the connection will work via a websocket and nothing goes via a third party.
The non-FOSS version works using the proprietary Google Services; which is the neatest way to say: SPYWARE, they can see all your message metadata in exchange for providing you with push notifications.
Finally, for advanced users, you could run your own push service; something like ntfy or Gotify, you have all the benefits of push notifications, which is not having an active websocket connection, which… basically preserves you some battery; whilst maintaining all privacy because only your server (and not Google’s) receives the metadata.
Yeah that’s a lovely feature too; matter of fact, I’m running Molly as my registered device on a VM, so it can make it’s ~10GB database backups quickly to Nextcloud which is on the same node.
Gives peace of mind too, as all my other Molly instances along with Whisperfish are just linked devices
) on my backup Android at home.
