[AMA] 2024-09-04 session: reply to this post to ask questions about everything you want
[AMA] 2024-09-04 session: reply to this post to ask questions about everything you want
Welcome to the second session! For the rest of my day, I’ll be looking for replies to this thread and will answer your questions. If something remains unanswered, replies can be posted even during the following days.
Just like the first time, there are no rules - “anything” is anything! Feel free to ask development questions, future plans, or things completely unrelated to Raccoon.
Most importantly, have fun!
What is one feature of Raccoon that you wish more people knew about?
Oh, this one made me think! My answer is a little niche and specific, but I would say the comment bar thickness / indentation.
For those who don't know, you can go to Settings > Content appearance > Comment bar thickness /Comment indentation amount.
Which can turn this:
Into this:
Since color doesn't work for everyone, I find these settings in particular to be incredibly helpful and effective.
Does Raccoon for Lemmy support notifications?
Normally, in commercial services, push notifications require support from the backend. The mechanism works approximately like this: the mobile app registers to a third-party provider such as Firebase Cloud Messaging (on Android) and APNS (on Apple Push Notification System) and obtains a device token, it then makes a network call to the server to communicate their device token (and the user ID this is associated to) and then the server dispatches notifications using the user ID to determine the events of interest and the device token to have it delivered via Firebase or APNS depending on the platform. Lemmy instances, unfortunately, don't do anything of that so client apps have to periodically poll for new events, which is terrible for both the battery and the network usage. Raccoon is no exception of this, if you look in the "Advanced Settings" screen under the "Experiments" section, there is an item named "Check for unread items in background". This is an attempt to use Android's WorkManager APIs to perform scheduled periodic operations such as checking for new mentions/replies/messages. Unfortunately, the scheduler does not seem so reliable so after some time the app is in the background the pending work can never get to be executed. It was an attempt and it should be refined.
What is the meaning of life?
I believe the usual answer these days is "42"...
Personally, I think it's more along the lines of finding meaning in life.