I would say “degooglelized” 
The APK from their website (if you can find it because they don’t advertise it) will autoupdate, so why bother? You’d be lying to yourself that “Signal in on F-Droid” somehow getting all the FOSS klout of F-Droid over a silo messenger?
Also, you know all the things they oppose to, yet you still want to use it? Why? 
Well, I wrote it in the next sentence: “Thus, new users can easily get Signal…”.
If you want to bring new and non-technical users to F-Droid you need to have certain apps. Besides a browser a proper messenger app is a must. I know there are many other messenger apps but being honest none are usable for non-techies.
It’s not all black and white. They have their reasons why they don’t federate, don’t want forks to use their servers etc. Mostly understandable for me. It’s still free software, isn’t it?
For me this is also one of the main reasons why Signal is the only free messenger on a par with WhatsApp et al. Sure, I hope this changes and there will be more but until then Signal will be my go to messenger.
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Yes, open apps, federated apps, honest apps, not siloed apps that are AGAINST F-Droid, why isn’t this paradox seen?
Did you try Conversations (or forks) yet? They’re damn usable… and truly open source from the server to the client.
You are not free to use their client if you compile it, you are not free to connect to their server it you host your own server, which freedom do you talk about exactly?
On par as being a closed silo? Yes… they are on par.
Are they violating the GPL-3.0 or AGPL-3.0 License?
Read We can include Signal in F-Droid and those links posted there.
A program is free software if the program’s users have the four essential freedoms:
From here: What is Free Software? - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation
- The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).
I can’t compile AND connect to their servers, right?
- The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
We have this? Maybe, but since there’s no federation I can’t swear the Signal server is not doing anything funny.
- The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others (freedom 2).
Not possible to since Google Services are not FOSS (well this is linked with the one below in the case of F-Droid)
- The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
And the reason for these endless threads, F-Droid can’t host a modified (truly FOSS) version.
So add the good points, subtract the bad ones, is the result 4 (four) freedoms or less? If it’s less…
/PS: I’m no lawyer so yeah 
Really, all you should read is: Signal >> Blog >> Reflections: The ecosystem is moving
The Conversations dev rebuttal: An Objection to The ecosystem is moving (I’ve recommended Conversations or forks above because the ecosystem moved in a good way)
And the comments on the 2019 Moxie rehash of the same text: https://blog.jabberhead.tk/2019/12/29/re-the-ecosystem-is-moving/
(fun fact Moxie took down the Youtube video of his own talk for some mystical reasons only to end up referencing if from Peertube a decentralized system later on as he needed to make some Twitter justifications of Signal’s development)
Also, did you see we host the Telegram client? That’s ironic…
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Not possible to since Google Services are not FOSS (well this is linked with the one below in the case of F-Droid)
As per the thread title and first post, I have made patches that let Signal compile and run without any of the Google Play Services or Firebase binaries. Hopefully no longer an issue!
I did ask the Signal devs in my pull request if they would mind distributing a fork on F-Droid and they declined, so the problem remains lack of permission from their end. It would be nice if Signal were to formally allow this or federation, but as noted they have their reasons. That might make it a “non-free network service” in F-Droid parlance but doesn’t violate the GPL. As other posters note there’s always Matrix, XMPP and similar…
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If someone would like to maintain a FOSS fork of Signal and make the server configurable, can F-Droid include it? Then I can self-host it easily without compile it.
Good idea, however Signal includes a lot of server URLs and signing/authentication keys as well which would be quite lengthy to type in; check app/build.gradle in the source. Compiling it is quite easy though, just follow the instructions in the Dockerfile.
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Wow, there are a lot of urls. It’s difficult to input manully, but maybe it can be shared with a config file or even QR code?
Please read what has been said AND repeated in this thread and others: IT’S NOT F-Droid’s DECISION!!!111111oneone
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I know that it not F-Droid’s decision not to include Signal. I have read almost all related links. I know that Moxie do not want that F-Droid host a Signal fork which use his server. So a Signal fork with configurable server has no relationship with OWS and their server.
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Ok, Ok, great, so link to the available server(s) please.
Signal Server is open source and there’s a few topics on the Signal Community Forums where people are trying to deploy the server.
@linsui’s idea might be reasonable e.g. for enterprises wanting to deploy their own server and a FOSS client to employees, much like VPN clients load config files. It would have to be renamed too and change artwork, a bit like the Loki Project who forked Signal into Session. No idea what Moxie & Co would think of that though.
So after 5 years they are still TRYING? None succeeded yet? But it’s open source… I heard.
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IMHO this doesn’t violate freedom 0. It’s like saying ‘you violate freedom 0 because you block federation to my instance on mastodon’.
Unless everybody hosts their own server this will always be true. This can’t be the way to go…
This is why I prefer p2p solutions like Jami for example.
As I wrote, to me it’s not black or white. Both make their arguments and I can understand their points of view.
Yeah, it’s not a easy process to self-host Signal though the server is open source. Looks like OWS don’t want to make it easy to self-host Signal. But that’s another problem. No other server available does not mean that such a fork is using OWS’s server. That depends on the user. If users decide not to self-host a Signal server and just use the OWS one, it’s their choice. After all, the Signal server is open source and self-hostable. 
Your instance still works, you can post and others can see, how is this analogy valid exactly?
Anyway, I’ll leave you to discuss this as you see fit, I think I’ve mentioned all the issues so you can make your own judgement. Keep in mind that: 1) Alternatives are out there (XMPP/Matrix) and 2) Any RFP will be accepted based on current Inclusion Policy and app specifics.
thanks
Agreed. Always good to have discussions and see a different point of view.
Update: My pull request for removing a few Google utility functions from the Signal codebase was merged and will be in the 4.72 series, thanks to Greyson Parrelli on the Signal team. Rest of the GMS stub code remains out of tree.
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