tl;dr :
- Hexchat IRC client app development stopped
- Linux Mint team was building IRC client to replace Hexchat
- The team tried Matrix and liked it
- Linux Mint’s communication channels are moving from IRC to Matrix
- The desktop app will be named Matrix to avoid confusion
I was trying to think of what the impactful differences between IRC and Matrix are (it’s been a while).
Persistancy! It’s funny how that completely slipped my mind. The expectation from a chat room app has changed a lot since I last regularly used IRC and I guess I forgot what it used to be like.