With the imminent arrival of the state hacking of end-to-end encryption, I decided to have another look at XMPP. Here are my notes.
This page offers a bunch of servers, and I chose to look at openfire.
Openfire
Atlantic Net gives instructions on how to install it on a linux box, whereas its authors have instructions too, which include some of the ports needed. It needs openfire and maria db. I did this on virtual box, and created a new ubuntu server; VB now has an unattended install, which led to having a US keyboard, not sure if this is a feature or a mistake by me. Anyway I fixed it, using settings -> keyboard -> +
- Install Java using apt, and Openfire using shell and dpkg, install Maria DB using apt and configure using SQL *,
- Openfire using https, then login to the admin coSetup the Openfire server using http[s], and then use the console to create rooms and user. *
- , and another run through the server parameters.
- I tested by trying to connect to the server using Thunderbird, there is a VB naming mismatch problem because I am lazy i.e. if I had a name server running on the VB, it might be simpler. The TB xmpp account needs the ip address or a name available to the chat client host, the room server argument needs the full name as specified in the admin console, which is partly derived from the OS hostname. Here’s mozilla on their chat/xmpp interface. , and here’s another how to use thunderbird post.
- On ubuntu, it would seem that the logs are in /var/log/openfire.
- I am not sure this runs on raspbian and the apt and deb routes are architecture specific; although source code is available.
ejabberd
I found this youtube video which recommends ejabberd for the pi. Does openfire work on the pi? There are hints it does.
Clients
One also needs clients, one on the phone would be good. Stork IM points at several servers; this maybe a better route.
I have a working server, I can login, it’s not on the internet so can’t share with other servers. I don’t think it uses starttls and have not worked out how to do OTR. I can login to the room on the server. I need to fix starttls, and then maybe test it on the PI. Does openfire run on the Pi? I have installed stork im but jabber cannot ‘see’ the vb server. Let’s test if a second user can send messages?