Lurker

• 0.9.97 — translation, server-side link previews, and a much smaller app Everything since 0.9.90, in one release.
• Live translation (new) Read and write in other people's languages, per channel. Settings → Translation to pick a service — a LibreTranslate instance is running at translate.irc.so, or point it at any OpenAI-compatible endpoint (Ollama, LM Studio, a cloud gateway). Then long-press a channel's name → Translate.
• Translate incoming — messages render in your language with a 🌐 badge showing what language they were written in, so you know which language to answer in. Post in another language — your message is translated and shown back to you with the original beneath it, so you can see what you're about to say before it sends. Press send again to post it; long-press send posts exactly what you typed, untranslated. Your own messages are never translated, "lol"/"hmm"/":)" never leave your device, and a broken translator can't trap a message — it tells you, and the next press sends it as typed.
• Link previews now resolve on your server Previously your phone fetched the linked page, and then its image, directly. A preview card draws itself, so scrolling past a busy channel quietly told dozens of site operators your IP address and rough location for links you never clicked. On Lurker 2.1.2+ with the previews container running, the server does that work and the app is handed a summary plus images served from your own instance.
• Two settings arrive from your server and sync across your devices, both off by default: Inline media (images, video, audio) and Link previews (articles, pages). Includes an image grid for multi-picture messages, article cards that pick a layout to suit the site's artwork, and YouTube cards that don't contact YouTube until you press play.
• Direct IRC mode is unchanged — there's no server there, so it still fetches on-device, and the setting now says so plainly.
• Smaller app, fewer permissions Voice calls have been removed. The WebRTC engine behind them shipped a large native library per CPU type and dominated the download:
• before after Play download 36 MB 14 MB Sideload APK 86 MB 37 MB The app no longer requests microphone, camera or Bluetooth permissions at all.
• Also fixed Settings no longer show toggles for features your server doesn't actually have. Link preview images sit flush in their card instead of floating with dead space. When Wi-Fi or an ISP intercepts the connection (hotspot sign-in, captive portal), Spooky says the certificate couldn't be verified and to sign in — instead of silently retrying forever. It still refuses to connect, which is the point, and recovers on its own once you're through.

Write a review