r/BlueBubbles

I am an iPhone and Mac user and today I am buying the new Z FOLD 8. It's imperative that I use Open Bubbles on the new android phone. I will also Host it on my Mac. My question is, am I still able to transfer my phone number from my iPhone to the Z Fold 8 and use Open Bubbles as my primary texting app? Will all texts go through it (iMessage and SMS)? Will it read as my number aka me for all my contacts or my Apple ID email? As far as anyone would know, they would have no clue that I switched to android? Thanks!

Hey I've brought it up on the discord so I'm sorry if you already saw, but my server went down for some reason and I'm currently out of town until the beginning of October, if ANYONE is willing to share their server or something until then I'd be willing to pay a bit of money upfront as I am unable to text some people easily at the moment. Thanks!

I recently switched back to BlueBubbles after a while on OpenBubbles but now I'm not receiving message notifications. I've already tried deleting my firebase project and starting over but I'm still not receiving notifications. Everything in the app says it's connected properly and Firebase status says "Configured" under notification providers. My Pixel also shows up on my Mac Mini server as a registered device.

Any ideas??

The FAQ states it's best to run MacOS Ventura and up, since it can handle Edited/Unsent messages. Doing a quick lookup, earliest Mac I can install Ventura on is Mac Mini (2018).

I want to place the mac in the garage and have it run BlueBubbles and never touch it again.

Is this a realistic setup? Can Mac Mini 2018 successfully handle BlueBubbles server? Or do I need to go up?

24/7

Just posting this as a PSA/search fodder about what worked for me since I didn't see any reddit posts, items in GitHub that identified this, or this specific issue in Discord. I didn't submit a bug report since this might be a one-off that is not reproducible.

My bluebubbles server is version 1.9.9 running on a Monterey Mac. My Android client was the play store version (2.0.0 I believe), but during troubleshooting, I upgraded to 2.1.0 via manual install.

Issue:

A week or so ago, notifications stopped being delivered to my Android phone. No matter what I did, notifications did not work on any Android device. The bluebubbles notifications providers on the Android device showed that Firebase was not configured. This was on an install that had been in use for years.

Final Solution:

1. Re-setup firebase (this may or may not be required) using the manual setup process. The Android client stated that firebase notifications were not configured, so I do not believe this was the fix.

2. Installed ntfy.sh on the phone, configured it in the Bluebubbles server, started receiving notifications using ntfy.sh.

3. Then, about two hours later, I disabled ntfy.sh notifications and firebase now showed as configured in the client. I'm now about 16 hours later and still receiving notices using firebase.

Actions taken while troubleshooting:

1. Uninstalled and reinstalled/reconfigured the client, to include clearing the cache and data multiple times.

2. Tried a different Android phone with a fresh install.

3. Rebooted the server and fiddled with a number of settings, to include resetting bluebubbles server and reconfiguring it from the ground up multiple times.

4. Added payment details to my firebase/google cloud account.

5. Deleted the firebase project and reinstalled using the manual method (great procedure BTW - super easy to follow)

6. Let things sit for quite a while in between a number of the steps just to make sure all the services had time to sync.

7. Reconfigured notification settings on the client at least a dozen times.

Observations while troubleshooting:

1. The client device was registering with the notifications service (as seen on the bluebubbles server), but notifications were not being delivered to my client.

2. The client was not aware of the firebase notifications server. It kept reporting that the firebase notifications service was not configured. No matter what I did (to include deleting my firebase project and manually reconfiguring it), it did not show up.

3. It was not until I added ntfy.sh, waited, then disabled ntfy.sh, that firebase showed configured in the client.

I have no idea why #3 would be required, but moving to ntfy.sh was a last-resort option to get my notifications working. I assumed I would be stuck with it for the time being, but a few hours later everything was working.

Hello! I'm really excited to use BlueBubbles, but I need assistance. I have a MacBook Air and an iPhone. I want to use BlueBubbles so that I can see my messages on a Windows computer via the web. What exactly do I install on my MacBook Air? How many steps are needed in the set up process? Is there more than one thing to install? Thank you!

I wanted to share my appreciation for the hard work put into the new update. I've been a user for over a year now and have to say that it has been a great experience & piece of software. Kudos!

The UI refresh is absolutely welcomed. The swipe-able image gallery is perfect. And I am thrilled with the general media attachment overhaul & that I can finally create a new chat and attach something to it (that was a PITA before...).

That said, what made me want to post was the unexpected "chat stats" feature! It has been absolutely hilarious and I wanted to share a bit:

I have a chat with FOURTEEN friends and, unexpectedly, it's chaos... I sent a few screenshots of the chat stats with the description "The app I use for iMessage just added chat stats. It is officially confirmed by the data that Sean and Pat are absolute menaces in this chat [top talkers and text first], James is an eager beaver [quickest response time] and my contributions are abysmal [I was tied for last]. "

A few highlights from the responses:

• Colin: "What app is this??"
• Me: "It's called BlueBubbles. It's what allows me to use iMessage on Android. Had to do it, otherwise, no one would talk to me with green bubbles lol"
• Gabe: "You are a trooper. Some android users would let the group chat suffer with green bubble….. 🍻"

This one was satire from our top talker:

• Sean: "When you’re too afraid to request Zoloft from a doctor, you text a chat of 14 people 636 times"

And my personal favorite:

• Colin: "I can’t wait for the yearly BlueBubbles wrapped now lol"

I also got a few "I want this for all of my group chats" as well as questions for how they can do this themselves (naturally, I sent them the links!).

So again, thank you and keep up the great work! I am looking forward to the server update & the new features to come!

Wish list (since I'm posting, why not):

• Better message syncing. Since the new update, not everything has been making it to my phone & I need to manually sync the chat messages. This could be my specific set up - web socket/VPN & GrapheneOS, which notoriously throttle background usage - but I'll even receive later messages & not know what they refer to. Then after a sync, everything comes in. I'd love an easy to access "quick sync"!
• Send multiple picture as one message so the recipient receives it as a "swipe-able gallery". This is likely a server feature, so it's understandable that it's not implemented.