Aparté

A terminal XMPP client written in Rust. Keyboard-driven with a vim-style modal interface, inspired by Profanity.

Features

Messaging

• Multi-user chat (MUC) and direct messages
• Message Archive Management (MAM) with lazy history fetch
• XEP-0333 displayed markers — track read state in MUC
• XEP-0184 / XEP-0333 delivery status — outgoing 1-on-1 messages show ✓ (delivered) and ✓✓ (read)
• XEP-0444 message reactions — emoji reactions displayed below messages
• XEP-0393 inline message styling — bold, italic, strikethrough
• Inline image display via Sixel

Privacy

• OMEMO end-to-end encryption, including MUC
• Decrypted messages are persisted locally so they remain readable after restarts, even though the OMEMO ratchet prevents re-decryption

Interface

• Vim-style modal editing — Normal, Insert, and Command modes
• Message search with /
• Tab completion for commands, JIDs, and nicks
• Consistent per-contact color generation
• Built-in color themes: profanity, catppuccin-mocha, catppuccin-latte, catppuccin-frappe
• Roster and bookmark management

Getting started

Aparté starts in Insert mode — type and press Enter to send. Press Escape to enter Normal mode for navigation, or : to enter Command mode.

Connect to your account:

:connect me@example.org

Join a room:

:join room@conference.example.org

Switch windows with Alt+[1-9] or :win <name>.

Modal interface

From	Key	To / Action
Insert	Escape	Normal mode
Normal	i	Insert mode
Normal	:	Command mode
Normal	/	Search mode
Normal	j / ↓	Select next message
Normal	k / ↑	Select previous message
Normal	gg	Scroll to top
Normal	G	Scroll to bottom
Normal	n / N	Next / previous search match
Command	Escape	Normal mode
Insert	Tab	Auto-complete
Any	Ctrl+L	Force full screen repaint

Commands accept unique prefixes: :conn resolves to :connect when unambiguous.

Install

Cargo

cargo install aparte

Arch Linux (AUR)

paru -S aparte-git
# or manually:
git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/aparte-git.git && cd aparte-git && makepkg -si

Guix

# From the GuixRUs channel (https://git.sr.ht/~whereiseveryone/guixrus):
guix pull && guix install aparte

# Or build from source:
git clone https://github.com/paulfariello/aparte --branch develop
cd aparte && guix package -f guix.scm

Windows (WSL)

Inside a Debian-based WSL environment:

sudo apt update && sudo apt install libssl-dev pkg-config curl
curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh
source ~/.cargo/env
cargo install --git https://github.com/paulfariello/aparte --branch develop

Configuration

Config file location: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/aparte/config.toml (falls back to ~/.config/aparte/config.toml).

# Audio bell on mention
bell = true

# Built-in themes: profanity, catppuccin-mocha, catppuccin-latte, catppuccin-frappe
theme_name = "catppuccin-mocha"

[accounts.example]
jid = "me@example.org/aparte"
autoconnect = true

Contact

Join aparte@conference.fariello.eu