Good way to send small messages between devices ?
Good way to send small messages between devices ?
Sometime i want to send small messages between devices, such as a url, a note, a id, a token, a piece of code, a picture Especially send between phone and laptop.
Some chatting app have self messages such as telegram saved messages, slack (you), Microsoft team...
However i don't want a bloated chat app that would took few hundred mb on phone, or required to install an app on my pc (linux which make many app broken). I don't want work chat app too, because self messages can be seen and scanned by employer (yes, a security add on chatbot on slack warm me because i send something like password to myself on slack)
Something like Opera Flow would fit perfectly, but i don't want opera browser.
Maybe kdeconnect?
SSH over Tailscale to Termux (all three free) using private-key authentication — two levels of e2ee, and fairly easy to use.
For small bits of text, I use one of these, depending on the direction and the source device:
- Laptop → phone:
xclip -o | ssh phone termux-clipboard-set - Laptop ← phone:
ssh phone termux-clipboard-get | xclip - Phone → laptop:
termux-clipboard-get | ssh laptop DISPLAY=:0 xclip - Phone ← laptop:
ssh laptop DISPLAY=:0 xclip -o | termux-clipboard-set
For larger things, or files, I use
scp. For other devices that I haven't setup beforehand, or can't set up (e.g. can't run arbitrary programs), I connect to my phone's hotspot, and use Total Commander's Wi-Fi transfer addon for files (both of which are also free). Small strings I just copy over by eye and hope it goes well.- Laptop → phone:
I use either KDE Connect (/gnome connect), or firefox
Idk why this is so low. Kdeconnect is all about sharing information between devices, url/file even notifications. It also has remote control and ping devices.
Depending on what your are doing kde connect and/or sync thing
+1 for KDE Connect.
Especially in OPs use case of transmitting small snippets such as urls, the automatic clipboard synchronization should be very useful.
Indeed, if you're just using devices on the same network, it just shares your clipboard. So if you copy something on one device, paste is available on the other. It's pretty sweet.
Try this small web app I made exactly for this https://kapus.app
I love your privacy/security summary. Thank you for your honesty!
This looks like a handy tool.
Thx! I made it for myself one evening when I needed to copy some passwords to my toy android before I managed to have cross platform password manager.
If you use a web email account, just create a draft email and don't send it. Then log into your email account on the other device and read it there.
This is the poor man's tech work-around and can indeed confirm it works lol. You are limited by your services upload size though so beware, you might find yourself having to do multiples and then it's just starting to get inconvenient.
Signal. I use it anyway so it's not an extra "bloated" app and I know all the secrets I send over the app are encrypted.
If you use a password manager, most have a notes feature that works well too.
+1 for Signal. It's already on my phone, and already on my PC and laptop. It is a simple Flatpak install on Linux. It's end-to-end encrypted. I use that for one-off notes and files between my phone and my PC or between my laptop and PC.
For notes and small files that I know I'll want to save to reference at another time, I put them in my KeePassXC database because that's already set to sync between devices.
Localsend is a good one to try out. Works with all devices and is pretty fast. It does however require an app to run.
For something you can run off the web on PC you can try pairdrop. This doesn't require an app to work on PC. Haven't tried it without the app on mobile so not sure if it will work on there via web.
I prefer Localsend over pairdrop due to local send being completely server less and all local.
Oh man I use local send every single day, it's phenomenal I absolutely love it. Can't stop raving about it
It's also worth mentioning that localsend has specific Linux support, so the app should run fine. I use it on my Linux laptop all the time!
A similar alternative to Pairdrop with a chat UI: https://drop.lol/
Local send works well for me between android and iDevices in most cases. I will say it struggles with VPN'ed connections, which is by design of the network and some VPN will block local connections.
I know sharedrop.io uses a similar web based model as pairdrop and runs into the same VPN issue, but I'm curious if the room function might overcome that in pairdrop.
Syncthing.
Linux pc + android phone - use Syncthing
Linux pc + iPhone - use KDE connect (or GSConnect for GNOME)
Kdeconnect/gsconnect is also on Android
Yes, they are on android but I prefer syncthing over KDEconnect/GConnect, mostly due to the issues I had when trying to use it over vpn.
FYI syncthing for android is getting discontinued, at least for now. :(
I've used Syncthing-Fork for years.
Plus, it's not like it needs much dev anyway, it works, and you can host your own resolver.
That's true, but there are some decent forks.
QR code reader and generator on both phone and laptop
- Phone: SecScanQR
- Laptop: ZBarCam and Zint
But I'm glad to have learned about LocalSend here so I'm no longer limited to short text snippets
Notes in Google Keep will sync between mobile and web
I've been working with this issue for along time. Trying to find something platform agnostic and works with vpns.
App wise, I suggest Localsend for files
Information wise, I suggest Saladroom although there are several alternatives as well like ToffeeShare and ShareDrop
I mostly use Signal though, as it's the simplest at hand app which fairly reliably makes it accessible to my various devices... With the downside of storing it.
I just use my note taking app
I use the note to self capability of my XMPP server to send a message to myself for these sort of one-offs. I would never want my data in the hands of some proprietary service if I have the option—sharing data just to yourself on these services also means it is Big Tech’s data now too. All of the XMPP clients are super lightweight.
Bigger cases, I will use scp, rsync, or magic wormhole. Or just using removeable storage.
What’s wrong with email? Or whatever note app you use.
I recently found out about patchbay. it's the bare minimum pubsub tool. no dependencies, you can use it with just curl.
that said, it's not in any way secure. if someone guesses the url you're using, they can see your messages.
All the listed options are nice but if you are looking for something more portable and doesn't require any installing, I recommend PairDrop.
I'm using Pushbullet to send messages, URLs, files between devices.
They stopped developing their iOS app years ago, if you have an iPhone it’s useless
Discord. I have a channel in one of my servers that's just me.
It's a huge failure of computing that this is the most convenient and obvious way to do this.
For sending over small stuff, I usually generate a qr code and scan it with the other device.
I use Beeper to aggregate messaging from various platforms and for easy availability of text messages on my PC. It has a specific "Note to self" section that I've found useful for messaging myself.
At its core, Beeper is just a Matrix client with some pre-packaged bridges for common services (including SMS, MMS, RCS messages). You could probably do the same thing with an Element client.
I just send an email to myself. sounds like it's something you wouldn't be allowed to do but you can
I usually just use an email draft for cross platform transfers. MacOS/iOS handle this pretty much automatically and Linux has a good option (KDE Connect) but it sounds like you’re on Windows.
Does Phone Link (built into Windows) work for your needs? I don’t use Windows often but I know they’re trying to make something sort of like the other OS’s syncing systems. Not sure how good it is.
Last I checked, KDE Connect can be installed on Windows as well. It's not locked into the KDE ecosystem or even Linux.
Best thing I’ve used in forever.
Requires Dropbox.
Would be great if it could let you sync stuff yourself, like with Syncthing or Resilio.
I refuse to use Cloud storages.
Still this is one of the best solutions I've seen.
Yup. That's my one hangup. Except you don't even need to install Dropbox. It just uses the Dropbox API (correct me if I'm wrong please).
The developer is a single(?) person based out of Germany and is pretty chill. I didn’t know it had Ubuntu and all support till after using it for a long time. I literally would use it just for iOS to Mac and back.
Depending on what I want to do, I used a combination of Unified Remote and LocalSend, both of which are available for Linux. With Unified Remote, I can control my PC on my home network. So if I want to copy over a URL, for example, I could open notepad and paste it remotely from my phone's clipboard (or type it manually), or I could open a new tab on my PC's browser and paste the URL so it's open and ready for me the next time I'm at my PC. I can sit downstairs on the couch and check the status of a project upstairs, open and run new programs upstairs, etc.
My only two complaints are that I need to be at the PC to handle admin messages like "Are you sure you want to install this program?", which I guess is a safety feature but it's still annoying. And secondly, I really wish they had an easier way to toggle between left- and right-mouse-click, it gets annoying.
To send images, actual files or even folders, I use LocalSend. It does require that you click Accept on the device you're sending to, but I can use Unified Remote to do that, and then save the files to wherever I want to (or accept the default).
This may be less streamlined than other options, but what I really like about it is that I can complete a task and then not have to think about it again. I don't have to go back to my desktop and download or save anything, I've already done it, the job's complete. The only exception is when I've put a new URL into my browser, but that's generally because I wanted to look at it on my (much larger than my phone's) desktop screen.
Anyway, it works nicely for me; I hope you find a solution that works for you!
Localsend has a config named 'auto-accept' or whatever it's called, in advanced settings.
Make'em take Trig courses daily, they'll start passing notes in no time.
Despite everything, Telegram is actually great. It's only bloated if you're using the features on the device, the client is opensource and there are native apps for any platform, it's very lightweight compared to other messengers and even to some dedicated filesharing solutions, it sends stuff p2p on the same network so you don't need to care about the traffic, but also it allows for on-demand downloads so if you want the stuff will be available outside of your network.
Alternatively, kdeconnect, but I find myself using Telegram instead 9 times out of 10, even though I have both installed.Email?
Google keep sounds perfect
Try plain-app
I like pairdrop/snapdrop or Google quick share
I often forget this is an option but it is web-based so it's pretty much always available.
Could try Briar. It works over bluetooth LAN network, or over internet via TOR. Has a linux, mac, windows, and android version.
You can make your own Discord or Discord alternative server
I have a discord DM to myself that I use.
Oh, posted this before I read the rest of your message lol. Nvm.