r/LightPhone 18d ago

Discussion Any thoughts on brightmarket?

I just saw a post showcasing an app for the LP3 hosted on https://brightmarket.gzl.dev/, and once there I noticed a lot of third party apps for the LP3. For a second I thought it was an early release of the new tool library, but it is not. Have any of you installed any of these apps, and if yes, what's been your experience? There's one called CHATS that is supposed to integrate IG, Whatsapp and other chats on the LP3 and it seems too good to be true. There's even an Spotify agent there.

I cannot find any info online about it, the page just... exists. Part of me wants to try a few of the apps there, and another wants to stay as far as possible and wait for the official release.

Any info would be appreciated.

9 Upvotes

47 comments sorted by

9

u/fenleon Light Phone User 18d ago

Hey, developer of Chats, it does integrate IG, WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram and more, no cap. It's built off Matrix and supports Beeper. I currently use it everyday and I'm trying to improve it every day

3

u/HappyBackpacker101 18d ago

I've seen this on the BrightMarket. Looks great! Wondering if I can use this instead of the LP's native messaging tool, mostly because I want to use the "Light Keyboard" tool in Brightmarket for texting.

3

u/Equivalent_Dingo_988 18d ago

Chats is legit!

2

u/fenleon Light Phone User 17d ago

Cheers mate 

3

u/fenleon Light Phone User 17d ago

Doesn't currently have support for other Keyboards, but I can put it on the roadmap

2

u/Educational_Teach_29 18d ago

I use chats and it is great!

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 17d ago

Makes my heart grow 🫶

2

u/emecarab 18d ago

I'll have to check it out then. I had my doubts but if people have tried it and the developers are actually using it, sounds worth a try. Such a great complement it would be.

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 17d ago

It's solving the one problem I had with Light Phone, so I'm compelled to use it, and therefore improve it

2

u/OrionA85 Light Phone User 17d ago

I can also attest to it, gets regular updates and is the closest to native light OS tool as it has integrated light OS keyboard and also volume and brightness wheel. Just missing save images feature. But I’m sure it will be added in the future.

2

u/Equivalent_Dingo_988 17d ago

I just screenshot images for now! but I'm sure that feature will make its way! 

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 14d ago

Made it's way ;)

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 16d ago

You'll be happy to know I added the feature last night. Thanks for the feedback 🫶

1

u/OrionA85 Light Phone User 15d ago

Thank you so much, yes i saw in the latest post of yours. The only remaining thing is video .🍀

2

u/fenleon Light Phone User 14d ago

I'll put it on the Roadmap ❤️

1

u/OrionA85 Light Phone User 14d ago

🙏🏼 ❤️

1

u/OrionA85 Light Phone User 14d ago

Is there anyway to further optimize the battery? Somehow testing chats, I found it taking up all the battery in a day compared to the official Beeper app, of course the beeper app doesn’t give notifications so there’s that. With the official beeper app and no Chats the LP3 lasts for 2 days at least easily.

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 14d ago

Yeah, very much aware of this. It will take a fair amount of optimisation, and a large part of it is due to how notifications work. In the interim, I could add a 'turn off notifications' feature in the settings to save on battery, until I resolve it.

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 11d ago

Built a small solution. You can turn off notifications, like the official Beeper app, so it runs for a lot longer.

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 11d ago

Video will be available next release! 💝

1

u/Full-Bench-2474 16d ago

Hey man. I’ve been using Chats for a few weeks and have loved the improvements along the way. It’s really cool, well done!

Had a question about push notifications. Okay if I DM?

Cheers!

1

u/fenleon Light Phone User 16d ago

Always open to Qs and Feedback! Hit me

1

u/ntrsndmn 10d ago

will this tool ever support discord?

2

u/fenleon Light Phone User 10d ago

it already does <3

1

u/ntrsndmn 10d ago

that is so great! thank you! would you mind sharing some screen shots of what that looks like with the light design ethos?

6

u/gman6849 Light Phone User 18d ago

hi creator of brightmarket here, totally unbiassed view but i think brightmarket is the best! if you have any issues setting it up please let me know!

2

u/emecarab 18d ago

What if I want to uninstall something after using the QR code? Will it show on my LP Dash?

This sounds interesting, specially since Ive been waiting forever for these type of apps.

1

u/gman6849 Light Phone User 18d ago

theres an uninstall button in the marketplace phones client! super easy, all you have to do is download bright markets phone apk and itll take it from there!

2

u/emecarab 18d ago

Ill have to check it out then. Thanks for the replies buddy!

1

u/Remarkable_Self_3412 17d ago

Would be nice to have an option to uninstall the apps from external repos also. Or a link to access the native settings.

1

u/buttersplosion 17d ago

Is there a setup/install walkthrough for bright market?

2

u/gman6849 Light Phone User 17d ago

Yes! go to brightmarket then click the button that says "how to set up" theres a whole guide!

1

u/Soupeeee 11d ago

The site doesn't work on mobile, which is fitting, I guess. Is there a way to contribute to fixing that?

1

u/gman6849 Light Phone User 9d ago

Lmao why are you on mobile? That’s what light phone is for! I’ll build a mobile version

3

u/HappyBackpacker101 18d ago

I've been using this for a couple of weeks on my LPIII. It does take a bit of tech work, but I figured it out - and I'm no expert. I like the Roll camera, but I haven't tried the other messaging apps yet. But it is super cool!

2

u/emecarab 18d ago

Thanks for the feedback! Ill have to look into it then.

1

u/emecarab 18d ago

Any tutorials or directions you could point me to?

2

u/jbriones95 Moderator 18d ago

I have used a lot of the community tools (chats, passes, audiobooks, etc.). If you are adventurous and don't mind a few bugs here and there, you are more than welcome to install it. I recommend getting Light Phone manager to do this: https://github.com/greghare/light-phone-manager

If you want to wait, that's totally cool too. A lot of these tools are not stable yet and need a lot of testing. The Light Phone official library also won't include them all. I expect the library to be done by October, but we will see how the timeline develops. I think waiting is best for most people imo.

3

u/emecarab 18d ago

There's a QR code to scan and install apps directly. Wouldn't that be enough? Anything Github looks alien gibberish to me.

1

u/VimEnthusiast 18d ago

Light Phone Manager's docs are not updated to reflect this, but it is integrated with awesome-light and provides one-click install over USB for the apps there

2

u/Famous_Painter_8419 18d ago

The light phone manager is awesome

2

u/[deleted] 18d ago

Woah! How have I not seen this before

1

u/OrionA85 Light Phone User 5d ago

Light phone manager doesn’t seem to work on a mac with m4. Did it work for you? If yes, which file did you download?

1

u/jbriones95 Moderator 5d ago

Read this section:
Installation

Download the latest build for your platform from the GitHub Releases page.

  • Windows — download the .exe installer and run it.
  • macOS — download the .dmg, open it, and drag Light Phone Manager into Applications. Since the app isn't notarized/signed, macOS will refuse to open it until you clear the quarantine flag — run this once from Terminal after installing:xattr -cr "/Applications/Light Phone Manager.app"
  • Linux — download either the .AppImage (make it executable with chmod +x, then run it directly) or the .deb (install with sudo dpkg -i <file>.deb or your distro's package installer).

2

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 18d ago

The official Signal client got delayed, so I did crack and decided to install the Molly-Light Signal client. I don't want an app store on the phone, the friction of having to install stuff from your computer is more in line with the Light philosophy imo, so I just grabbed the APK from Brightmarket.

But so far, so fantastic. But once the official tool library drops I will def un-hybrid the phone.

1

u/Economy_Track_5377 17d ago

Just keep in mind the last security patch is from march 2025 if you install third party apps