An Encrypted Picture is Worth A Thousand Notes 🖼️
We're excited to announce the release of White Noise v0.2.0!
This update brings a host of new features, improvements, and bug fixes to enhance your experience.
Here's a comprehensive summary of the changes since the latest tagged release **v0.1.4** (released on September 22, 2025):
🚀 Major New Features
🖼️ Media Support & File Sharing
- Complete media upload system: Added ability to upload and send images through chat messages.
- Blossom server integration: Implemented optimistic media uploads to Blossom servers for decentralized file storage.
- Media preview & thumbnails: Added image previews, thumbnails, and media galleries within chat messages.
- Media reply functionality: Users can now reply to messages containing media with preview support.
- Image modal viewer: Full-screen image viewing with scroll support.
- Media file management: Complete media file upload model with upload states (uploading, uploaded, failed).
🔔 Background Sync & Notifications
- Background sync service: Added WorkManager-based background synchronization for messages and invites.
- Foreground task service: Implemented foreground service for real-time message syncing (currently 1-second polling).
- Push notifications: Added notification system for new messages and group invites when the app is in the background.
- Notification permissions: Added proper notification permission requests on the contact list screen.
- Android notification icons: Added proper notification icons for different screen densities.
🌎 Internationalization (i18n)
- Multi-language support: Added comprehensive localization system supporting 8 languages:
- English (en)
- German (de)
- Spanish (es)
- French (fr)
- Italian (it)
- Portuguese (pt)
- Russian (ru)
- Turkish (tr)
- Language selection: Added language picker in settings with system default option.
👥 Group Management Enhancements
- Add members to existing groups: Users can now add new members to existing group chats.
- Group image management: Added ability to upload and update group profile images from group settings.
- Group avatars in messages: Added user avatars display in group chat messages for better identification.
🔧 Improvements & Fixes
📱 UI/UX Enhancements
- Chat input improvements: Enhanced message draft logic and chat input functionality.
- Message positioning fixes: Fixed message bubble jumping and positioning issues in reaction context menus.
- Haptic feedback: Improved haptic feedback for chat context menus.
- Keyboard handling: Fixed keyboard covering text fields and improved keyboard-aware scrolling.
- Header pinning: Pinned navigation headers in auth flow screens when the keyboard is open.
- Bottom sheet improvements: Fixed start chat button cut-off and other bottom sheet UI issues.
- Status bar visibility: Fixed status bar icons invisibility on auth screens (iOS and Android).
💪 Performance & Stability
- Chat loading optimizations: Improved chat loading performance and reduced delays.
- Group image path optimization: Optimized group image path loading and DM header rendering.
- Message sync improvements: Enhanced message synchronization and reduced duplicate processing.
- Draft message system: Improved message draft saving and restoration logic.
🐛 Bug Fixes
- Group updates: Fixed group name and description updates not reflecting in real-time for other group members.
- DM creation: Fixed 2-user group creation when DM already exists.
- Profile image upload: Fixed broken profile image upload functionality.
- Double rendering: Fixed double rendering issue for some messages.
- Notification polling: Optimized notification polling intervals for better battery life.
🕸️ Code Quality & Architecture
- Metadata cache removal: Removed metadata cache provider for simplified architecture.
- Contact → User Profile: Renamed "contact" terminology to "user profile" throughout the app.
- Rust crate updates: Updated whitenoise and mdk crates with latest improvements.
- Edition 2024: Updated Rust code to use Rust Edition 2024.
- Test improvements: Enhanced test coverage for draft message service and other components.
🛠️ Development & Build System
- Android build improvements: Added justfile commands for building test APKs for android-arm64.
- Kotlin plugin update: Updated Kotlin Android plugin from 1.8.22 to 2.2.20.
- Zapstore configuration: Updated zapstore publishing configuration.
📊 Statistics
- 60+ commits since v0.1.4.
- Major contributors: @codeswot, @josefinalliende, @untreu2, @Quwaysim, @jgmontoya, @erskingardner, @vladimir-krstic
- Timeframe: September 22, 2025 to November 5, 2025
(approximately 6 weeks of development).
