When the Open Social Web Hybridizes: Raccoon for Friendica is a new app… Mastodon. And it even has a little Lemmy in it! That’s why the Free Software + Fediverse duo is such a valuable resource.

@fediverse

Raccoon 1.0 was finally released for Android in recent days, a rather innovative client originally created for #Friendica, but which has now become one of the most innovative apps for the user experience on #Mastodon. The app is available for Android (already on the Play Store and Izzidroid, and will soon be available on F-Droid), but a #Debian package has also been released. An iOS version remains to be seen for its success.

The app introduces some very important innovations to the federated app landscape.

1. Navigate the Fediverse from an app, even without creating an account

Raccoon is the only app that lets you browse the Fediverse even without an account. When you install it, you can select any Friendica or Mastodon instance and “leverage” its local public and federated timelines. This way, users can explore multiple instances before choosing which one to open an account on. Of course, even after adding an account (the app manages multiple accounts), you can browse the timelines of servers other than the one you signed up to.

2. “Browse through” messages: “swipe” navigation

Unlike all other social apps (both those for the Fediverse and those for commercial social networks), #RaccoonForFriendica lets you open a post in your timeline and continue browsing through previous and next posts by simply swiping left and right.
This is a truly interesting ergonomic innovation.

3. Finally a formatting bar in social apps

Since the app was created for Friendica, it features a built-in formatting toolbar reminiscent of Lemmy clients (in fact, the developer @janTeko first experimented with app development with a Lemmy app). The formatting toolbar can also be used for Mastodon instances running the Glitch-soc fork, such as infosec.exchange, tech.lgbt, and my poliversity.it instance, which was the one the developer experimented with.

In addition to being more immediate, writing formatted posts is also made easier by a “preview” function that helps avoid errors in Markdown or BBCode coding.

4. Finally, Mastodon users will be able to enjoy Fediverse groups too.

As you may know, Mastodon doesn’t support the display of group posts. Even if you select a group, you’ll still see a single timeline where top posts alternate with replies. Searching for a thread on Mastodon is therefore very complicated, but the #Raccoon developer has found a way to enable “topic” viewing across all accounts that are “activitypub groups,” be they #Lemmy, #NodeBB, Piefed, Mbin, Peertube, Wordpress, Mobilizon, Flipboard, etc.
This idea also came about thanks to the fact that the developer had previously tried his hand at developing an app for Lemmy and was able to experiment with the formatting bars and display of Lemmy “communities,” which are nothing other than “#activitypub groups.”

5. Other interesting features

Among other features, you can

6. What’s still missing?

The app features all the features found in most other Mastodon apps, except one: the correct handling of Mastodon posts that quote other posts. These are still displayed in a fairly primitive way. The developer is trying to decide whether to adapt to Mastodon specifications or reinterpret the feature in a more personalized way.
It must be said that, unfortunately, the implementation of quoted messages (already present in Friendica for ages) was implemented by Mastodon very late, only in recent months, and in a very “personal” way that many other software developers did not appreciate.

7. Raccoon is an app that will benefit users who already use Mastodon but also those who have never “tried” the Fediverse

This app has been under development for almost two years, and the beta version is just over a year old. However, version 1.0 has resolved all previously encountered issues.
Based on user feedback, the developer will evaluate whether to create an iOS version and even a Windows version.
Anyone who wishes to allow reporting of application errors can enable anonymous crash reports.

8. Links and Resources

This is the developer’s profile:
https://androiddev.social/users/janTeko

This is the app repository: https://github.com/LiveFastEatTrashRaccoon/RaccoonForFriendica/

This is the Play Store link:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.livefast.eattrash.raccoonforfriendica

This is the link on IzzyDroid (the app will be released on F-Droid soon, but is currently under review):
https://apt.izzysoft.de/fdroid/index/apk/com.livefast.eattrash.raccoonforfriendica

Here is the developer’s blog:
https://livefasteattrashraccoon.github.io/blog/

Finally, from here you can download the .apk or .deb package without using the online stores. line:
https://github.com/LiveFastEatTrashRaccoon/RaccoonForFriendica/releases/latest/

One last recommendation

The public’s response will be important to enable the further development of this app.
If you want to test it on Mastodon, I recommend using instances running the glitch-soc fork. Among these, I’d recommend the infosec.exchange instance, which is well managed by @jerry. And of course, but only if you communicate in Italian or Esperanto, I’d be happy to host you on my poliversity.it instance.
Regarding Friendica, I recommend two instances: friendica.world, managed by @ruud and featuring a rather lively timeline, and, of course, social.trom.tf, excellently managed by @tio.
If you communicate in Italian, I’d be happy to host you on my poliverso.org instance.

Greetings to all and let me know if you need further information, if you have tried the app and how you found it.
Francesco
You can also interact with me through the Mastodon account @informapirata and the Friendica account @notizie

  • InformaPirataEnglish
    2·
    1 day ago

    oh, a clarification: I’m still @[email protected]

    I’m a fan of Lemmy, though I recognize that some limitations could be considered flaws (https://piefed.social/comment/11707767).

    However, your perspective must take into account some design (and history) issues with the software you mentioned:

    Lemmy barely works with PeerTube [discuss.tchncs.de]

    It’s important to understand a few concepts here:

    • Lemmy is based on Activitypub groups
    • A group works by “resharing” an initial post and all replies to that post
    • With some programs (Mastodon’s “socialverse,” Misskey, Pleroma, Friendica, or Pixelfed), you can “post inside a group” only by mentioning the “group user”; with others (Lemmy/Piefed/Mbin/NodeBB’s forumverse, but also Peertube, Mobilizon, or Flipboard), you simply assign a discussion to a group (you can do this easily from the interface). This second mode doesn’t yet have a syntax shared by all the software in the Fediverse.
    • Finally, a very important feature of Lemmy is that a post can only be published to one channel at a time. This might seem like a limitation (we’ll discuss it later, when talking about Flipboard), but it’s actually designed by the developers to prevent synchronous crossposting, which can dramatically increase spam.

    Lemmy handles the display of Peertube content very well and correctly assigns it to the correct Peertube channel. What doesn’t work well is the update system, which is why Lemmy can’t act as a Peertube feed reader. This isn’t Lemmy’s fault, nor is it Peertube’s, as each handles Activitypub groups differently.

    Lemmy doesn’t work with Pixelfed [discuss.tchncs.de]

    That’s not true. Lemmy handles Pixelfed very well. Pixelfed users can open threads on Lemmy or reply to Lemmy discussions. However, Pixelfed only shows users retweets made by Pixelfed, not those from other software. Therefore, Pixelfed users cannot access the groups. Regarding your user, I’d like to point out that feddit.it can see it: https://feddit.it/u/[email protected]

    Lemmy doesn’t work with Loops [discuss.tchncs.de]

    Loops is still a very immature software, with very limited interoperability. I wouldn’t consider it a valid test for certifying Lemmy’s functionality. Regarding your user, I’d like to point out that feddit.it can see it: https://feddit.it/u/[email protected]

    Lemmy doesn’t work with Micro.blog [discuss.tchncs.de]

    I’m not familiar with Microblog, but (regarding your user) I’d like to point out that feddit.it can see it: https://feddit.it/u/[email protected]

    Lemmy doesn’t seem to work with Flipboard

    Flipboard uses groups to manage the “magazines” of the “main accounts.” Magazines are the thematic sections of the main account. Basically, the main account (for example, @[email protected]) publishes a news item, and depending on the topic, it can be published in the “Science” Activitypub group (@[email protected]) or the “Environment” Activitypub group (@[email protected]), OR both. This design, intended to maximize visibility on the Mastodon audience, is incompatible with Lemmy’s logic. Lemmy, in fact, as I mentioned before, doesn’t allow synchronous crossposting of the same content across multiple groups.

    The same goes for Misskey.

    Lemmy handles Misskey very well. And Misskey handles Lemmy very well. I don’t understand the problem.