Robrix: a Rust Matrix client built atop Robius

Robrix is a Matrix chat client written in Rust to demonstrate the functionality of Project Robius, a framework for multi-platform application development in Rust. Robrix is written using the Makepad UI toolkit.

▶️ Click here to see the Robrix project tracker!

Note

⚠️ Robrix is a work-in-progress that doesn't yet support all Matrix chat features.

Check out our most recent talks and presentations for more info:

• Robrix: a Matrix chat client and more (from GOSIM Europe 2024)
  • Videos: YouTube link
  • Slides: PowerPoint (22MB), PDF version (16MB)

The following table shows which host systems can currently be used to build Robrix for which target platforms.

Host OS	Target Platform	Builds?	Runs?
macOS	macOS	✅	✅
macOS	Android	✅	✅
macOS	iOS	✅	✅
Linux	Linux	✅	✅
Linux	Android	✅	✅
Windows	Windows	✅	✅
Windows	Android	✅	✅

Building and Running

1. First, install Rust.

2. If you're building on Linux or WSL on Windows, install the required dependencies. Otherwise, proceed to step 3.

   • openssl, clang/libclang, binfmt, Xcursor/X11, asound/pulse.

   On a Debian-like Linux distro (e.g., Ubuntu), run the following:

   sudo apt-get update
   sudo apt-get install libssl-dev libsqlite3-dev pkg-config llvm clang libclang-dev binfmt-support libxcursor-dev libx11-dev libasound2-dev libpulse-dev

3. Then, build and run Robrix (you can optionally add --release after run):

cargo run -- 'USERNAME' 'PASSWORD' ['HOMESERVER_URL']

• Robrix only supports a standard username + password login currently.
  • Note the usage of single quotes (not double quotes), which will prevent your shell from treating certain symbols as globs/regex patterns.
  • If you created your Matrix account using a third-party Single Sign On (SSO) like a Google account, you can set a standard password by using Element's password reset form.
• The HOMESERVER_URL argument is optional and uses the "https://matrix-client.matrix.org/" URL by default.
  • The Matrix homeserver must support Sliding Sync, the same requirement as Element X.

Building Robrix for Android

1. Install the cargo-makepad build tool:

   cargo install --force --git https://github.com/makepad/makepad.git --branch rik cargo-makepad

2. Use cargo-makepad to install the Android toolchain, with the full NDK:

   cargo makepad android install-toolchain --full-ndk

3. Build and run Robrix using cargo-makepad:

   • Fill in your username and password in the login.toml file.
   • Then use cargo makepad to build and run:

     cargo makepad android run -p robrix --release

   • You'll need to connect a physical Android device with developer options enabled, or start up an emulator using Android Studio.
     • API version 33 or higher is required, which is Android 13 and up.

Feature status tracker

These are generally sorted in order of priority. If you're interested in helping out with anything here, please reach out via a GitHub issue or on our Robius matrix channel.

Basic room views and fundamental actions

• View list of joined rooms
• View timeline of events in a single room
• Fetch and display room avatars
• Fetch user profiles (displayable names)
• Fetch and display user profile avatars
• Backwards pagination (upon viewing a room timeline)
• Dynamic backwards pagination based on scroll position/movement: project-robius#109
• Loading animation while waiting for pagination request: project-robius#109
• Stable positioning of events during simple timeline update
• Stable positioning of events during complex/multi-part timeline update
• Re-spawn timeline as focused on an old event after a full timeline clear: project-robius#103
• Display simple text-only messages
• Display image messages (PNG, JPEG)
• Rich text formatting for message bodies
• Display multimedia (audio/video/gif) message events: project-robius#120
• Display reactions (annotations)
• Handle opening links on click
• Linkify plaintext hyperlinks
• Link previews beneath messages: project-robius#81
• Reply previews above messages: project-robius#82
• Send messages (standalone, no replies)
• Interactive reaction button, send reactions: project-robius#115
• Reply button, send reply: project-robius#83
• Error display banners: no connection, failure to login, sync timeout: project-robius#121
• Collapsible/expandable view of contiguous "small" events: project-robius#118
• E2EE device verification, decrypt message content: project-robius#116

Auxiliary/admin features: login, registration, settings

• Username/password login screen: project-robius#113
• SSO, other 3rd-party auth providers login screen: project-robius#114
• Dedicated view of spaces
• Dedicated view of direct messages (DMs): project-robius#139
• Keyword filters for the list of all rooms: project-robius#123
• Search messages within a room: project-robius#122
• Room browser, search for public rooms
• Room creation
• Room settings/info screen
• Room members pane
• Side panel showing detailed user profile info (click on their Avatar)
• Ignore and unignore users (see known issues)
• User settings screen
• Persistence of app session to disk: project-robius#112
• Save/restore events in rooms to/from the event cache upon app shutdown/start: project-robius#164

Known problems/issues

• URLs do not wrap properly; that is a Makepad-side problem.
• Matrix-specific links are not yet fully handled (https://matrix.to/...)
• Ignoring/unignoring a user clears all timelines (see: matrix-org/matrix-rust-sdk#1703); the timeline will be re-filled using gradual pagination, but the viewport is not maintained