Liftoff!

Hey all!

Saw some chatter across the community and just wanted to give an update of where things are.

It's been a busy summer with vacations, work and the craziness that comes along with it. I personally had 2 new additions to my family (twins!) and was on parental leave for a bit then figuring out the new work routine with the additional kiddos!

All that being said things are starting to stabilize for me and I'm getting back into the swing of Liftoff development. I have a laundry list of items I plan to tackle during the long weekend in the US:

• Move through the backlog of open PRs and get those merged
• Look into the unwarranted post view refresh that I've seen reported
• Triage the GitHub issues list
• Sluggish FPS

Additionally we're actively discussing larger user experiences that we're thinking about changing, specifically multi instance and cross instance account handling. You can track that discussion and please contribute your thoughts here:

https://github.com/liftoff-app/liftoff/issues/251

Thanks for using the app, and thanks for being an active community. Excited for what's to come!

As always please join us on matrix!

Hi All,

Thanks for bearing with us while we've done some deep digging to resolve a few issues that we know have been causing problems for users. Some other great changes have been added by our growing team of contributors as highlighted below. If you want to join the team come and say hello at the team discussion on Matrix. Please keep your feedback coming here too, as it really does help us identify key areas for further work.

Updates should appear on TestFlight and Play Store today.

v0.10.10 Release

iOS:

• App Store (available once Apple review process has completed)
• TestFlight (should be visible later today)

Android:

• GitHub
• Play Store
• If you want to stay up to date with the latest releases before it gets on Play Store or F-Droid, checkout Obtainium

Change log

• Fixed issues with video player muting other audio
• Show thumbnails in full height cards
• Fixed list view refresh
• Updated defaults for themes
• Remove duplicates from infinite scroll

Screenshots

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Sorry.

It doesn't matter which instance I put in it just gives me a red X and an error. I noticed it wasn't last updated until July 2023 does this app still even work anymore am I doing something wrong? Any help would be appreciated thank you very much for your time.

I was fine with the app as it was, but it appears now there needs to be a small fix

Anyone else having trouble logging back in after Lemmy.world's last server update? It just spins forever after I click Sign In, doesn't even give me an error.

This goes to anyone like me who's still using this app

Liftoff doesn't have anything that deletes old data from cache, which means with time it will take up a good amount of storage, so we have to clear it manually every once in a while

You probably already know how by now but if you don't:

settings app > apps > liftoff > clear cache or long press liftoff icon > app info > clear cache

The clear cache button might be hidden behind a storage or data submenu.

I think I was around 850MB this time, so y'all are probably around 1GB

Let's keep coping that liftoff is still maintained even though the last commit was in July.

Btw I don't care that someone else usually does this, I'm bored.

Now that 0.19 is in testing on a couple of servers we're faced with the reality that Liftoff is probably not going to be functional for much longer. So I'm curious what everyone's got planned.

Personally I've got my eye on !raccoonforlemmy@lemmy.world which is currently under development but looks like it might be the closest to my ideal. Developer describes it thusly:

> I liked the feature richness of Liftoff (e.g. the possibility to explore all the communities of an external instance), the multi-community feature of Summit and the polished UI of Thunder and I wished I could have them all in the same app.

It's currently very promising, but also very buggy so I'm hopeful it might be in a more usable state by the time 0.19 starts majorly rolling out. We shall see. The dev put out a call for testers a couple days ago but I'm sure more wouldn't hurt if anyone wants to give it a whirl.

I've tried most of the main Android options by this point, Summit gets the most use just because of multi-communities (great for sports and other happening-right-now events) but I'm really not a fan of its interface.

Boost looks nice and simple, but I find a lot of the features to be just straight-up broken.

Sync and Eternity both put me off with their looks even though they look totally different to each other!

Connect would probably be my second choice so far, but I'd still need to keep Summit around for the multi-communities which is a bit annoying.

That's about the extent of my investigations at this point. Would love to hear which you've tried and what you like / dislike from the point of view of a Liftoff user. Let's get some recommendations ironed out before everything breaks and this group is overrun with people asking why 😅

Whenever I try and go to this instance it shows that an unexpected error has occurred. What's the dealio?

The website itself appears to work.

It's that time again Lemmings, and no apologies for that image. The My Chemical Romance cover is better.

Don't forget to clear your Liftoff cache. Liftoff currently does not have an auto clear cache feature.

For those who don't know how, Android instructions are below

1. Long hold the Liftoff icon and select App Info
2. Select Storage and Cache
3. Press Clear Cache

Feel free to share your cache size and not compare our addictions.

I can see front page but then filtering by subscription, local etc I get "something went wrong" message. It's the app broken or just me? I cleared cache just in case but not working still.

If I delete a message in Liftoff, does it delete it only on my end, or on the receivers end also?

Hey The Dev, this is just a one off, random non technical user's ( I know what <br> does and thats it) question thar are you still advancing (developing has such a Heavy Tone in it) your app? I mean, I LOVE it for the heavens, particularily on the user interface, but its kind of lagging behind of abilities of other Lemmy apps.

Also the big concern is general security as time flies by.

So as a very satisfied but also a little concerned user: whats upp? Is the app still in development, even slow burn?

Edit: I'm a wee bit drunk and not an english speaker, okay, I edited some typo's.

There is (as far as I know) no easy way to copy a user handle to mention them in a post or comment. There isn't a UI element or menu option on a post to do this. I can go to their just page and use the share button, but then I get (for example):

https://lemmy.guide/link?target=@zachatrocity@sh.itjust.works

That's not Zach's instance, it's mine. To get the user handle I'd have to edit out the URL part, and change to the correct instance @zachatrocity@lemmy.world.

Is that how it's supposed to work? Is the instance change thing a bug? Is there a better way I don't know about?

Hi, is there an option to hide a post in Liftoff? I'd like to hide a couple of posts I have in my feed.

Thanks!

I just checked GitHub and it looks like the last branch update was 3 months ago, is the Dev MIA or is this a planned break?

It's that time again Lemmings.

Don't forget to clear your Liftoff cache. Liftoff currently doesn not have a auto clear cache feature.

For those who don't know how, Android instructions are below

1. Long hold the Liftoff icon and select App Info
2. Select Storage and Cache
3. Press Clear Cache

Feel free to share your cache size and not compare our addictions.

Was hoping this would sort itself out, but after a couple weeks it's still there. Scrolling not always smooth, and swiping back from a post is always very studdery.

Wondering if others are experiencing this? Phone is 2 weeks old, came from a Pixel 7 Pro which didn't have this problem.

I’m thinking of becoming a mod and want to know how good Liftoff! is for that. Is it easy to use?

The programming.dev instance is up via browser but for some reason the Liftoff app is getting a 502 error. I have removed my programming.dev account from the app and tried to add it again but I still get the 502 error. Any suggestions?

I've gone through the prompts to attach an image from my phone's gallery to this post. I suspect that it won't be there, just like my recent attempts to post to pics@lemmy.world. Is this an issue with the app or my instance?

There's no way to read replies to my comments and posts after they've been marked as read.

Also, when viewing replies to my comments from my profile menu, there's no way to go to my comment in the original post to view the context of the reply.

I have the permissions set to open associated links but it doesn't work. Also, is there a way to create multi-reddit like viewing? I like grouping different related communities together for browsing.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/5711722

> We are getting closer to the next major release. This version will have many breaking changes, so we are listing them here for app and client developers to adjust their projects. > > As we prepare for the release of Lemmy 0.19.0, we'd like to provide any app or client developers ample time to upgrade their apps, as well as discover any problems, before we do the release. This will be at least 4 weeks from now (but likely longer). > > Server admins can also upgrade to the latest release candidates for testing. Be aware that they are still unstable and shouldn't be used in production. As with any upgrade it is important to have working backups in place. > > It should be possible for clients to support both Lemmy 0.18 and 0.19 without major workarounds. If backwards compatibility is causing you trouble, comment below and we will help to find a solution. > > To test, you can point your app to the following test instance running a release candidate of 0.19.0: https://voyager.lemmy.ml > > A diff of API changes is here: lemmy-js-client API changes from 0.18.3 -> 0.19.0-rc's > > Note for developers not using typescript or rust: > > If you'd like to auto-generate an API client for your language, you can try out @MV-GH's lemmy_openapi_spec, or (if in kotlin), use Jerboa's script here. > > ## Major Changes > > ### Authentication > > Previous Lemmy versions used to take authentication as query/post parameters. This is insecure and unnecessarily complicated. With 0.19, the jwt token can be passed either as cookie with name auth, or as header in the form Authorization: Bearer . > > A major advantage is that this allows us to send proper cache-control headers, with responses to unauthenticated users being cacheable. It also prevents token leaks in web server logs. The login and registration endpoints attempt to set the cookie automatically. If that is supported on your platform, you don't have to worry about the authentication token at all. > > In order for your client to be compatible with both Lemmy 0.18 and 0.19, you should send auth in both ways. Meaning with each API call, send the old auth query/post parameter, as well as the new header or cookie. > > A few PRs detailing these changes: > > - https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3725 > - https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3926 > - https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3946 > - https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3982 > > ### Users can block instances > > Users can now block instances, so that their communities are hidden from listings. This is done via POST /api/v3/site/block with parameters int instance_id, bool block. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3869 > > ### New sort options > > A new scaled sort option has been added. This sort is identical to the Hot sort, but also takes into account the number of each community's active monthly users, and so helps to boost posts from less active communities to the top. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3907 > > ### 2FA / TOTP Rework > > Two-Factor-Authentication is now enabled in a two-step process to avoid locking yourself out. Now a secret needs to be generated first with POST /api/v3/user/totp/generate (no parameters). The generated token needs to be added by the user to an authenticator app. > > Once this is completed, 2FA can be enabled with POST /api/v3/user/totp/update. This takes a string parameter totp_token (generated by authenticator app), and boolean enabled. 2FA can be disabled again with the same update endpoint. Additionally, the 2FA algorithm has been changed to SHA1 for better compatibility. > > The update disables 2FA for all accounts, so that users who are locked out can use their accounts again, and to ease the transition to the SHA1 algorithm. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3959 > > ### Timestamps now include timezone > > Previous Lemmy versions used timestamps without any timezone internally. This caused problems when federating with other software that uses timezones. > > Going forward, all timestamps in the API are switching from timestamps without time zone (2023-09-27T12:29:59.113132) to ISO8601 timestamps (e.g. 2023-10-29T15:10:51.557399+01:00 or Z suffix). In order to be compatible with both 0.18 and 0.19, parse the timestamp as ISO8601 and add a Z suffix if it fails (for older versions). > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3496 > > ### Cursor based pagination > > 0.19 adds support for cursor based pagination on the /api/v3/post/list endpoint. This is more efficient for the database. Instead of a query parameter ?page=3, listing responses now include a field "next_page": "Pa46c" which needs to be passed as ?page_cursor=Pa46c. The existing pagination method is still supported for backwards compatibility, but will be removed in the next version. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3872 > > ### New endpoints for export/import of user settings data > > Users can now export their profile settings data (including subscriptions and blocklists) via GET /api/v3/user/export. The returned JSON data should not be parsed by clients, but directly downloaded as a file. Backups can be imported via POST /api/v3/user/import. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3976 > > ### Make remove content optional during account deletion > > When a user deletes their own account using POST /api/v3/user/delete_account, there is a new parameter called delete_content. If it is true, all posts, comments and other content created by the user are deleted (this is the previous default behaviour). If it is false, only the user profile will be marked as deleted. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3817 > > ### Outgoing Federation Queue > > The federation queue has been rewritten to be much more performant and reliable. This is irrelevant for client developers, but admins should look out for potential federation problems. If you run multiple Lemmy backends for horizontal scaling, be sure to read the updated documentation and set the new configuration parameters. The Troubleshooting section has information about how to find out the state of the federation queues. > > https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/pull/3605

As seen in the screenshot, there's a lot of wasted space in landscape mode on my tablet. I don't see this issue in the feed. I've only noticed it when viewing it editing posts and comments.

It's that time again Lemmings.

Don't forget to clear your Liftoff cache. Liftoff currently doesn not have a auto clear cache feature.

For those who don't know how, Android instructions are below

1. Long hold the Liftoff icon and select App Info
2. Select Storage and Cache
3. Press Clear Cache

Feel free to share your cache size and not compare our addictions.

I recently saw an article (https://stackdiary.com/heap-buffer-overflow-in-libwebp-cve-2023-5129/) that said WEBP images could be a huge security hole right now and I know Lemmy uses a lot of WEBP images.

I'm not sure how long this has been known, so maybe the Liftoff devs already took care of it. Does anyone know if Liftoff has already made the necessary patches?

Are any of these features already existing (and can be activated, but I didn't see how)?

(1) Making the sub-lemmy in the header have a different color so the user can visually spot the topic before reading the title

(2) Moving the header road footer, so see the topic/sub-lemmy after the title of the post

(3) removing the exclamation mark in the sub-lemmy header across the app. Since it's present in all sub-lemmy's it is a bit a nuisance

(4) change the size of the sub-lemmy names in the list of subscribed sub-lemmy's

(5) write in user's points in the about tab

(6) graying out titles of posts already read

(7) search through posts you only upvoted (but not saved). This may be a Lemmy feature request and not just Liftoff though as I've seen this lacking from all other apps I tried

Thanks for making a really awesome app!

Look at this post https://sh.itjust.works/post/5863836

It's just a regular image post, hosted on the instance server, but it displays as an external link, &amp; you have to click through to view it.

Earlier, similarly formatted posts to the same community display as normal image posts.

The only difference is that the newer posts include an additional ?format=jpg parameter. I'm guessing this is throwing off the detection of an image post.

On relay for Reddit there was a function where I could use keywords like "Putin" and it would filter out all posts with that word in it's title.

I yearn to clean up my frontpage.

See title. I'm grateful to the app creators, but as I use this app on a daily basis it hurts that I have to switch to sync just to get a proper grasp on what people are replying to regarding my comments.

The normal option, when pushing on replies, doesn't go high enough on the context chain. The context option however goes too high, adds extra 'side' replies and I find myself searching for my initial comment again, which is a painful and avoidable task.

A rework would greatly be appreciated. F.e. it would help if the context option would focus on the new reply and let me decide how far I want to scroll upwards. Instead of just focussing on the top level comment.

Are there any plan for app lock built with app like in eternity app in near future.

At first I thought this was due to different instances but looking closer, it's the same post duplicated. I think this is the first time I've seen them together.

I've seen double posts before but they were separated in the timeline, so I put it down to instances.

Anyone else seen this?

From time to time this appears and I don't know how to clear it other than restarting the app. Clicking login does nothing. Is there any other way to clear??

It appears to be up on Web, but I can't seem to get it to load in at all on Liftoff, and I've been making sure to be on my Beehaw account.

I have cleared my cache and checked for updates. Is this just a me problem or a bigger problem?

Scenario: me killing time by doom scrolling lemmy. I see a post linking to a news article. The next 4 posts are the exact same post in the same community by the same user but on a different instance.

I understand the general mechanics behind lemmy so I know this is standard behavior. However, this can become quite tedious and annoying.

My suggestion: when the device pulls new posts if the same title, content, and user are detected, it combines them into one post. For comments, it creates a "root/parent comment" for each instance.

Up and down votes could be an issue though. My resolution to this would be when you press up/down vote a drop-down menu appears with "All" followed by all the different instances. I can think of lots of different mechanics for multi selections.

For the main feed, where the instance is normally stated, it states only the community followed by "multiple" or similar. When tapped, instead of taking you to that community on that instance, it has the equivalent of a help bubble pop up listing the instances so you could visit each one.

It would also be nice if something like this was possible for duplicate posts on the same instance across multiple communities.

Mine was sitting at 5GB. Hope we get auto cache emptying at some stage.

Is it possible to get an "All" button in the saved items section?

Searching for saved items across the same filter as your search is annoying and clunky. I'd like to be able to see all my saves across time in one place.

Hi. Would it be possible to introduce a type of search based on all Lemmy servers? Currently you can only select one server, searching all servers would be great.

Hi there! Can the hide NSFW toggle hide the posts themselves, not just the post contents. I'm afraid to browse All anywhere other than at home because the post titles explicit enough.

Thank you!

Just a RSS button that opens the feed of a particular community.