Unfortunately, there is currently no native, working Signal client for UT and this is unlikely to change soon. But if that's a problem that impacts you, read on! I found a solution that works well for me and maybe it will work for you, too.
My solution consists of several parts:
- Signal for Android, running in Waydroid. You can download it from their webpage or from F-Droid or Aurora Store.
- Signal Desktop running on several computers, and linked to the first Signal, which is the primary device. All others are secondary devices. You can have only one primary.
- Cinny, running on UT, using a Matrix bridge to connect to Signal. This is very new to me and yet it was easy.
I followed these instructions given by Danfro:
For everyone here who is looking for an alternative to use Signal on Ubuntu Touch.
There is a matrix signal bridge hosted here: https://tchncs.de/matrix.
This can be used with Cinny or any other Matrix client. Instructions are given on the website there.
Note: Some things do still not work. Image download is fine, but right now no other file types. I am working on it...
- Open Cinny (or another matrix client)
- create a new room
- invite the bridge bot @signalbot:tchncs.de
- open your primary signal device and head for settings, linked devices
- add new device
- got to chat with bridge bot and type "login" as message
- scan the qr code with your primary device, it should now link them
Done.
I had an extra step because my primary is running in Waydroid and it's a pain generating and scanning a QR code on one and the same device, plus it refused to work. So I installed the latest Cinny on a spare phone and used that to link Cinny to Signal. It worked fine.
I hope this is useful to anyone else!