How quickly did you complete the process? You only have say 20 seconds to enter the details before you are timed out and the code expires.
20s???
I already tried as fast as I could. Maybe I will try it again, this time (hopefully) faster
Iāve tried it again and measured the time. It took me less than 20s and it still didnāt work 
Has anybody a tip on how to complete the registration faster? (If the time even is the problem)
I doubt time is the problem. I also tried again a few times and I can complete the steps well before the captcha in the browser says āverification expiredā. Iām putting the āprefixā dropdown to my country code, and then putting my phone number without the leading zero. I assume that is correct because if I put the zero I get an error 400 bad request instead, and whisperfish shows and error and needs to restart.
Iāve been using Whisperfish for a few years now. Itās a fantastic product, and Iām glad to see that itās being kept alive.
3 Likes
I finally managed to register!! 
But now I have another problem: I can correctly receive messages, but I canāt send them. When I try it with --verbose , the last lines read this:
[2022-05-26T18:12:24Z DEBUG libsignal_service_actix::push_service] HTTP request PUT https://chat.signal.org/v1/messages/9d2f3c66-7614-4d3d-82df-93d7ae67c96a
[2022-05-26T18:12:25Z DEBUG libsignal_service_actix::push_service] AwcPushService::put response:
ClientResponse HTTP/1.1 428 Precondition Required
headers:
"x-signal-timestamp": "1653588745215"
"date": "Thu, 26 May 2022 18:12:25 GMT"
"content-type": "application/json"
"content-length": "88"
"connection": "keep-alive"
"retry-after": "86400"
[2022-05-26T18:12:25Z TRACE libsignal_service_actix::push_service] Unhandled response with body: Ok(b"{\"token\":\"ac61d6db-7316-483f-8fc6-ee1ebe9956a1\",\"options\":[\"recaptcha\",\"pushChallenge\"]}")
[2022-05-26T18:12:25Z ERROR harbour_whisperfish::worker::client] Sending message: Error sending message: Unexpected response: HTTP 428
Is this new, or has anybody already solved this?
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It looks like Signal servers have determined that you must pass another reCaptcha (or āpushChallengeā) in order to send messages, for whatever reason that may beā¦ I canāt give you answers, but I can ask you for more details:
- Is it a new-new registration, or has it ever been registered to Signal before?
- If yes, do you still have Android/iPhone Signal installed and running?
- If yes, did you activate the registration lock? (I guess not, because you did register successfully)
How did you manage to do it?
- it is NOT a new-new registration, I have recently switched from /e/OS to SailfishOS, so I did use the Android-Signal-Client before
- Yes, I still had an Android-Client running, but I assumed that would be deactivated automatically if I register on a new device/with a new clientā¦?
- I did NOT activate the registration lock
@d.geelen When I connect to my phone via SSH and then use the command it does not work. However, if I use the command directly, like it states in the wiki: ssh defaultuser@[target] harbour-whisperfish --verbose --captcha '<THE URL HERE>' it works.
I donāt know why this is the case and it doesnāt make any sense (at least to me), but this method works reliably (I used it two times this day).
@NIS Okay, that sheds some light. I think the captcha didnāt work correctly, the Android Signal client messes things up - possibly both.
I suggest you (make a backup and) uninstall the Android Signal client. It canāt be active at the same time.
I also suggest you clear the Whisperfish data dirs and try to register again. This time use the intermediate file trick, because it looks like some component between your computers clipboard and harbour-whisperfish binary disturbs the long captcha string. Itās slightly more complex, more reliable.
Thank you for your help, I will try that tomorrow.
If it fails again, I will report back 
As far as I know, none of these should matter.
We seem to bounce on a rate limiter, implemented one year ago, Signal-Android commit 31e1c6f7aa.
Maybe try again tomorrow (sending a message). If that doesnāt work, we need to implement something around the 428.
I tried it again with the steps @direc85 suggested. It still does not work. I can receive messages, but I canāt send them. It just shows the circle-icon:
It also still prints out the same error message (428):
[2022-05-27T11:57:17Z DEBUG libsignal_service_actix::push_service] HTTP request PUT https://chat.signal.org/v1/messages/da3c83ad-8c45-4d14-87d5-e164fc584d92
[2022-05-27T11:57:18Z DEBUG libsignal_service_actix::push_service] AwcPushService::put response:
ClientResponse HTTP/1.1 428 Precondition Required
headers:
"connection": "keep-alive"
"date": "Fri, 27 May 2022 11:57:18 GMT"
"content-type": "application/json"
"content-length": "88"
"retry-after": "86400"
"x-signal-timestamp": "1653652638324"
[2022-05-27T11:57:18Z TRACE libsignal_service_actix::push_service] Unhandled response with body: Ok(b"{\"token\":\"6090bb08-659a-47ea-824e-7c38ee61fc4d\",\"options\":[\"recaptcha\",\"pushChallenge\"]}")
[2022-05-27T11:57:18Z ERROR harbour_whisperfish::worker::client] Sending message: Error sending message: Unexpected response: HTTP 428Hi, thanks for testing! Iāve filed two bugs, representing two parts of this issue.
The first one represents the case that these 428ās appear and annoy a user (which is quite a severe case), and can be potentially fixed with a workaround.
The second represents the fact that Signal implemented the 428ās, and should be implemented in the way Signal intends us to: show a new captcha.
2 Likes
So, is there a workaround I can use in the meantime?
Not that I know, sorry. Iām pinging the Axolotl people, maybe theyāve heard it before. Iāve had a very quick skim through the Signal source code. Either they have added Whisperfish to their list of UAās (and they didnāt publish), or Iām overseeing something, because I donāt see why it would send you a 428 (except if youāre somehow spoofing a Signal UA, but that would mean you compiled WF from source and changed some stuff).
Oh, something that you can try: thereās a āretry afterā header. Close Whisperfish for at least 24 hours. Start it again. It may work.
1 Like
Thank you, I also managed to register now. Iām not convinced that the solution is the different ssh command, because like you say that makes no sense, and I re-registered today (because the first time I put a password, but I didnāt release that it was for the app, not for a signal account). Yesterday registration indeed worked first try, but today I had to try 5 or 6 times before it worked. So likely the answer is indeed either to be faster, or just keep trying until eventually it succeeds.
Re. your issue with sending messages I can say that all my contacts seem to later registrations, so I canāt initiate a conversation, but once they talk to me it does seem to work. I.e. I can reply to them and they receive the message. I havenāt verified this yet with my new registration (waiting for someone to say something :p).
One thing that didnāt work was sending a picture, that did get stuck on the circle icon, and didnāt show as a message on the other end. I donāt have logs for this (yet).
OK, that means itās limited to one specific case for now. I think the āwait 24 hoursā will help. Letās hope. That would reduce the severity of the bug by a lot.
Attachments seem to have broken recently. @direc85 was writing up an issue for that later