A few weeks ago, we mentioned implementing messaging in Normals. Currently, only one-on-one calls are possible, but we've managed to get it working while maintaining privacy, the rules, and the philosophy. If it's well-received by the community, we might consider expanding the chat to group chats, but this is still a costly architectural decision that we would need to cover. However, we hope you find it useful. As Team Lead for https://normals.me/, I'm available to answer any questions related to this, both functional and architectural.

The basic description, security and architecture information is in the announcements thread on Mastodon and Normals.

#fediverse #Chat #VideoCall

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[–] Fizz@lemmy.nz 4 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Nice work. Is this intra instance only or can one normal user call another normal user on a separate instance?

[–] baldur@normals.me 4 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Thanks! Right now calls are between Normals accounts only. There's no standard for calls in ActivityPub yet, it covers posts, follows and replies, not real-time audio or video, at least not yet. So there's nothing we could federate a call over yet :(, and as far as I know Mastodon, Lemmy and the rest don't have calls either.

Federated calling does exist on other networks (Matrix, and XMPP with Jingle), but not in the ActivityPub Fediverse. If a standard shows up, we'd love to look at it, as long as calls stay e2e encrypted.

[–] anarcockworkorange@anarchist.nexus 1 points 2 hours ago

You could format a message with xmpp connection data, so both parties could "dial" and talk, if the client is aware of the format. A bit contrived, but workable.

[–] baldur@normals.me 2 points 16 hours ago

Both posts described:

https://mastodon.social/@normals/117591037523397630/ https://normals.me/c/announcements/01a1c46c-fa18-744c-8ab0-55836b57323d/new-on-normals-direct-messages-and-calls-you-can-now-message-people-and-call-the