motd is a native Android IRC client with a Telegram-style chat UI, built in Kotlin with Jetpack Compose and Material 3. It speaks IRCv3 and works best paired with a soju bouncer, but connects fine to plain networks too.
When connected through a bouncer, motd detects capabilities over CAP and turns
them on automatically: infinite scrollback (draft/chathistory), cross-device
read state (draft/read-marker), several networks over one account
(soju.im/bouncer-networks), and push (soju.im/webpush + UnifiedPush). On a
plain network it falls back to local-only history and a persistent socket.
The public landing page shows the same
deterministic app captures kept in screenshots/. Refresh all
three frames with the isolated, headless fixture—no physical device or live
IRC account is needed:
nix develop -c ./test/e2e/headless.sh showcase| Chat list | Conversation | File uploader |
 |
 |
 |
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Chat UI | Unified chat list with unread/mention badges; grouped bubbles, day separators, event pills, inline images, and OG link previews. |
| Composer | Nick autocomplete, replies (+draft/reply), reactions (+draft/react), typing (+typing), and slash commands (/msg, /query, /join, /me). |
| Search | FTS4 full-text search over history, global or scoped to one buffer, with deep-jump to the matched message. |
| Scrollback | Paging 3 backed by a draft/chathistory RemoteMediator; local-only fallback on plain networks. |
| Read state | draft/read-marker (MARKREAD) sync through a single ConnectionManager entry point. |
| Multi-network | soju.im/bouncer-networks (BOUNCER BIND): one root connection plus per-network child bindings. |
| Delivery | Persistent-socket foreground service, or UnifiedPush + soju.im/webpush with on-device RFC 8291 (aes128gcm) decryption. |
| Theming | Material You dynamic color, curated editor/terminal palettes, custom nick colors, and refined generated chat wallpapers. |
| Transport | okio over SSLSocket, SASL PLAIN/EXTERNAL, client certificates via Android KeyChain, IRCv3 STS pinning. |
Requires Android 8.0 (API 26) or newer.
GitHub Actions defines the canonical CI jobs (see
.github/workflows/). For local work, the Nix flake
provides JDK 21 and the Android SDK; direnv loads it via .envrc, or run the
commands under nix develop.
Initialize submodules recursively before rebuilding the bundled libbox AAR:
git submodule update --init --recursive.
nix develop -c ./gradlew :irc:test # protocol tests (pure JVM)
nix develop -c ./gradlew :app:testFossDebugUnitTest # app unit tests (Robolectric)
nix develop -c ./gradlew :app:assembleFossDebug # Google-free arm64 debug APK
nix develop -c ./gradlew :app:lintFossDebug :app:assembleFossDebug # FOSS checks + APKThe unfinished Google/FCM flavor is currently excluded from CI APK builds and releases. Its paused implementation notes remain in Firebase push setup. For Google-free push, see ntfy and UnifiedPush setup.
The debug APK lands under app/build/outputs/apk/foss/debug/. Install it with adb install. The debug build carries the .debug application-id suffix, so it can
coexist with a release install.
The embedded VLESS + REALITY transport uses bundled libbox, which is currently arm64-v8a-only. APKs built from this source tree must not be installed on 32-bit ARM or x86 devices. Other ABI support needs a separately pinned and verified libbox artifact.
The official F-Droid build uses the foss flavor only. Its metadata supplies a
full source commit, semantic version, and deterministic version code; the
checked-in defaults in gradle.properties keep ordinary source builds
versioned as well. F-Droid removes the checked-in libbox AAR and dormant
Google/Firebase sources before scanning, then rebuilds libbox from the pinned
sing-box, Android-submodule, and gomobile sources into
app/build/generated/libbox. The source-build procedure and metadata guidance
are in docs/fdroid.md.
F-Droid builds retain the arm64-v8a-only embedded transport. The F-Droid signature is independent from the GitHub release key, so switching channels requires uninstalling the GitHub-signed package before installing the F-Droid package.
On first launch the empty chat list routes you to onboarding. Add a network and connect.
To connect directly to Libera.Chat:
- Host
irc.libera.chat, port6697, TLS on - A nick, and SASL PLAIN with your NickServ credentials (or SASL NONE)
To connect through a soju bouncer, point the network at your bouncer's host and
port and authenticate with your bouncer account. motd then negotiates bouncer
capabilities and, with soju.im/bouncer-networks, manages your upstream
networks from a single connection.
For a CLoak bouncer, follow the dedicated CLoak connection guide.
For SOCKS5, Tor, or VLESS + REALITY configuration, see the obfuscation guide.
See ARCHITECTURE.md.
Copyright 2026 Trevor Arjeski. motd is licensed under the GNU General Public License, version 3 or (at your option) any later version; see LICENSE. Third-party licensing and libbox source provenance are recorded in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.
Questions, bug reports, and feedback: join #motd on
Libera.Chat (irc.libera.chat).
Releases are cut by pushing a signed v* tag. The tag workflow runs FOSS
release-parity tests and lint, then builds and signs the FOSS APK. versionName
and versionCode come from gradle.properties; the workflow requires the
signed tag to match v<versionName>. This keeps the upstream-signed APK
reproducible by F-Droid without changing its update-compatible signing key.
The managed-device smoke and exhaustive emulator journey remain available as separate workflows, but currently do not gate releases because hosted emulator System UI failures can occur before MOTD starts.
git tag -s v0.1.0 -m "v0.1.0"
git push origin v0.1.0CI decodes the keystore from KEYSTORE_BASE64, runs the full build with the
signing env (MOTD_KEYSTORE_PATH, MOTD_KEYSTORE_PASSWORD, MOTD_KEY_ALIAS,
MOTD_KEY_PASSWORD, MOTD_SOURCE_COMMIT), and attaches the APK, GPL and IBM Plex licenses,
deterministic complete libbox source, SHA256SUMS, and release-specific
third-party notice. Required
repository secrets: KEYSTORE_BASE64, KEYSTORE_PASSWORD, KEY_ALIAS,
KEY_PASSWORD. The Google/FCM APK is not built or published. Maintainer and
agent details are in the
release runbook.
To dry-run locally, run nix develop -c ./gradlew :app:assembleFossRelease with the
signing env set (or the debug signing config).
This project has been developed with assistance from large language models. LLM-generated contributions are reviewed, tested, and maintained by the project maintainer, who remains responsible for the published code and releases.