Session Release Roundup #2: Fresh apples!

It’s been a crazy couple of weeks since we last talked, and iOS 1.2.0 is rolling out now. This brand-spanking-new iOS release is brimming with bug fixes and quality-of-life boons. We know the app has been having some teething issues — but hang in there, we think Session will have you smiling soon! Here’s everything that’s shipped and slated for Session. 

In the apple cart: Changes in the latest Session updates

Multi-device users reported some strange encounters of the third kind behaviour with friend requests, but these fixes should clear those problems right up.

•  Fixed multi-device friend request acceptance (iOS)

•  Fixed multi-device auto-generated friend request bug (iOS)

•  Contacts now sync when using multi-device (iOS)

Push notifications were acting more like crawl notifications. If you’re using the Apple Push Notification service (APNs) and your push notifications have been arriving slowly, in clumps, or not at all, this should help fix that.

• Fixed APNs token uploading issue (iOS)

Multi-device has been suffering from multi-issues — lots of you couldn’t even get your devices linked at all. These changes should make linking devices and using multi-device much smoother! 

• Made device linking more reliable (iOS)

• Fixed multi-device display name updating bug (iOS)

• Fixed multi-device message status bar updating bug (iOS

You might’ve heard whispers of zombie RSS feeds haunting Session. No matter how many times you deleted them, they always came back! Well, we double-tapped ‘em for you — Loki News and Session Updates RSS feeds will no longer come back if you delete them. 

• Made default RSS feeds deletable (iOS)

• Don’t auto-join default RSS feeds (iOS)

Some messages were getting lost in the ether due to issues with message delivery, so the network will now store your messages for longer to make sure you get them before they’re deleted. 

• Increased message Time-To-Live (iOS)

• Improved message fetching performance (iOS)

Nobody wants to see nasty images they never asked for. Although friend requests can’t contain images, your profile image still shows — so it was possible for someone to send you an unsolicited image (their profile picture) before you accepted their request. 

• Don’t attach the sender’s profile picture URL to friend request messages (iOS)

We’ve done a complete overhaul of the codebase to keep Session feeling rosy (i.e., less crashes, less weird bugs, and less weird UI issues). This should also make things easier for us when we’re debugging and updating things going forward.

• Fixed various database handling bugs (iOS)

• Fixed various minor UI issues (iOS)

• Fixed various crashes (iOS)

• Major refactoring of the Session protocol layer (iOS)

• Added tests for Session protocol corner cases (iOS)

Not quite ripe: Changes planned for upcoming Session updates

You asked for it, and you’re getting it: Session habla español! For those waiting on other translations: hopefully Session will reach polyglot status soon, but we want to make sure its Spanish is up to scratch first. The good news is, the process of transforming Session into a shining Spanish star should mean we’re ready to rumble when we move on to future translations.

The next mission for Session is to get another big list of fixes implemented for Android and Desktop clients. Until then, iOS users still might run into some issues when talking to their non-iPhone friends. Session en español will roll out in the next big Android update, which should be coming in the next few weeks (that’s right robot lovers, we haven’t forgotten about you). 

Beyond that, we’ll be working on something called shared sender keys, which will make closed groups bigger and better than ever before. And it just wouldn’t feel right if we didn’t spend some time working on multi-device, so we’re planning to start work on a new multi-device approach which should mean faster message syncing across devices. 

Thank you!

Once again, we love hearing all your thoughts and feedback about the app — it really does mean everything to us! So long for now, and thanks for all the support.