I've been usimg Jerboa since I started with Lemmy but it hasn't fully convinced me yet. What app do you recommend? I am looking to replicate the look and feel of RIF.
I'm in the same exact boat as you friend, used rif for basically a decade. I've been using Jerboa as well, it's alright but I know what you mean, not the same.
I have heard a lot of good things about boost, they're still finishing up their app, you can find it in the app store and pre-register now. I'm hoping that finishes soon and can fill that void, it looks like it can be customized to look kinda similarly to rif.
I always used RiF and never tried any other third party app because I didn't feel the need to. Coming to lemmy I tried every alternative I found and stayed with Voyager (formerly wefwef). It's a WPA inspired by the defunct Apollo client for reddit and I'm liking it even more than RiF, although it's quite different. Being a WPA streamlines the development and it shows, it reached v1.0 a few days ago. Jerboa was ok when it was the only alternative to plain web interface, but right know is quite behind imo.