Fractal 5.beta1 is the first beta release since the rewrite of Fractal to take advantage of GTK 4 and the Matrix Rust SDK. It is the result of over two years of work.

New features since Fractal 5.alpha1:

• Joining room by ID, by alias or with a Matrix URI
• Creation of direct chats
• Sending and displaying read receipts, read markers and typing notifications
• Notifications on new messages
• Highlight messages with mentions
• Added media file history viewers in the room details, thanks to our GSoC intern Marco Melorio
• Displaying the other user’s avatar as a room avatar for direct chats

Of course, there are a also a lot of less visible changes, fixes and translations thanks to all our contributors, and our upstream projects.

As the version implies, this is still considered beta stage and might trigger crashes or other bugs but overall should be pretty stable.

A list of blocking issues for the release of version 5 can be found in the Fractal v5 milestone on GitLab.

Fractal 5.alpha1 is the first release since Fractal has been rewritten to take advantage of GTK 4 and the Matrix Rust SDK. It is the result of eighteen months of work.

Currently supported features are:

• Sending and receiving messages and files
• Sending files via Drag-n-Drop and pasting in the message entry
• Rendering of rich formatted (HTML) messages, as well as media
• Displaying edited messages, redacting messages
• Showing and adding reactions
• Tab completion of user names
• Sending and displaying replies
• Sharing the current location
• Exploring the room directory
• Sorting the rooms by category
• Joining rooms
• Sending and accepting invitations
• Logging into multiple accounts at once
• Logging in with Single-Sign On
• Sending and reading encrypted messages
• Verifying user sessions using cross-signing
• Exporting and importing encryption keys
• Managing the connected devices
• Changing the user profile details
• Deactivating the account

Major missing features are:

• Notifications
• Read markers

As the name implies, this is still considered alpha stage and is not ready for general use just yet. If you want to give this development version a try, you can get it from the GNOME Apps Nightly flatpak repository (See wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Nightly).

A list of known issues and missing features for a 5.0 release can be found in the Fractal v5 milestone on Gitlab.

This new major release is the result of 10 months of hard work.

New features:

• Videos now have a preview directly in history
• New videos player: click on a preview to open it
• Improved audio file support, with a nicer presentation and seeking
• Redacted messages are removed from history
• Edited messages are replaced with their new content and show a small icon
• Translations have been updated
• Spellcheck language is saved per room
• New swipe-back gesture to go back from room to room list in narrow view
• New swipe left and right gesture to navigate through media in media view
• SOCKS proxy are now also supported

Bugfixes:

• Thumbnail for pasted images have been fixed
• File type detection for uploads is more reliable
• Typing notifications are now only sent when text is actually typed in the message input

Under the hood:

• Code refactor is still going
• Some improvements to logging, including access token removal for privacy

This new minor release is the result of 2 months of hard work.

New features:

• Translation strings have been updated

Bugfixes:

• Newlines now work when markdown is enabled
• Account settings can be accessed again
• Redaction is working again
• Compatibility with HTTP-only (non HTTPS) servers has been restored
• Some crashes fixed

Under the hood:

• Code refactor is still going

This new minor release is the result of 2 months of hard work.

New features:

• Autocompletion popover position fix
• Translation strings have been updated
• Disable the textbox when there are no write permissions

Bugfixes:

• Fix crash on logout and login with wrong credentials

Under the hood:

• Code refactor continues

This new major release is the result of 7 months of hard work by 37 contributors pushing over 200 commits.

New features:

• Adaptive window, mobile friendly
• Window size and position are remembered
• Redesigned login
• Spellcheck
• Network proxy support
• Typing notifications
• Badges are shown for operators and moderators
• Keyboard shortcuts for easier navigation across rooms
• Audio and video files are now tagged correctly
• Image files have a thumbnail
• Various tweaks to the file chooser

Bugfixes:

• Logs actually output something now
• A few issues with invites and direct chats have been resolved
• More reliable scrolling
• Some crashes fixed

Under the hood:

• Code refactor continues
• We’re now using Rust 2018
• Many improvements to the build system and CI

This new major release is the result of 3 months of hard work by 25 contributors pushing over 340 commits.

New features:

• Enhanced history view with adaptive layout, day divider
• Reorganised headerbar, app menu merged with user menu
• Larger display of emoji-only messages
• Some performance improvements
• Opening a room jumps to first unread message

Bugfixes:

• More reliable notifications
• Fixed display bug for avatars

Under the hood:

• Large code refactor
• Logging infrastructure
• Continuous integration
• More informative build output